Chinese billionaire is accused of stealing research from a Duke lab

Liu
Ruopeng studied at Duke University in 2006 under Dr David Smith,
one of the world’s experts on metamaterials

TODAY
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• Liu Ruopeng — known as China’s Elon Musk —
  studied at Duke University from 2006 to 2009 under David Smith,
  one of the world’s leading experts on
  metamaterials. 
• Smith has accused Liu of taking his research and
  replicating it in China for his own gain. 
• Some observers, including a former assistant director
  of counterintelligence at the FBI, believe that Liu was sent to
  Smith’s lab by the Chinese government.

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A Chinese billionaire who studied at Duke University allegedly
stole a professor’s ideas behind special invisibility technology
— and then developed his own prototype back in China.

Liu Ruopeng, known as China’s Elon Musk, is just 35
years old and is believed to be worth $2.7 billion, according to
the
“Today” show.

But before he created his money-making “Future Studio” in China,
Liu studied at Duke University from 2006 to 2009 under David
Smith, one of the world’s experts on metamaterials, or “some
weird material that doesn’t exist in nature,” as the professor
describes it.

Some observers, including a former assistant director of
counterintelligence at the FBI, believe that Liu was sent to
Smith’s lab by the Chinese government to steal intellectual
property.

Smith had been working on a prototype for an invisibility cloak,
and the US military had poured millions into his research. 

The invisibility cloak doesn’t necessarily make a person
disappear, but it makes objects invisible to microwave signals.

At one point while at Duke, Liu convinced Smith to allow him to
bring his old colleagues into the lab to work on projects for the
professor.

When Smith was out of the lab, the Chinese researchers took
photos of the lab and its contents, and also took measurements of
Smith’s equipment.

Much to Smith’s surprise, an exact replica of his invisibility
cloak prototype was built in Liu’s former lab when the Chinese
researchers returned home.

“It sounds like theft,” Smith said. “If we were a company you
might think so.”

Liu claims that his time in the lab was “fundamental research” he
brought back to China when he was finished at Duke.

Now, nine years after graduating from Duke with a Ph.D, Liu is a
multi-billionaire, the inventor of a jet-powered surfboard, the
founder of a $6 billion tech company, and features a prototype of
an invisibility cloak in his own lab.

He has denied all wrongdoing, calling the claim that the Chinese
government sent him to Duke to learn from Smith “ridiculous” and
“far away from the truth.”

“I don’t want to use the word copy,” Liu said. “People can share
the experience … and build something … different.”

Shortly after Liu graduated in 2009, Smith discovered an email
which shows the student admitting he had withheld information
from the professor, adding that he had been working toward
commercializing the research in China.

Smith told
NBC News that if the email had emerged while Liu was still a
student, he wouldn’t have a degree from Duke.

The FBI opened a case into Liu in 2010 to investigate whether it
was theft of US intellectual property.

“We know that certain government officials and operatives met
with him while he was in the United States,” former FBI Assistant
Director for Counterintelligence Frank Figliuzzi said.

He added: “Was he handled, approached, compromised,
recruited, and subsidized when he took it back to China? My
theory says yes. This was more than just a grad student taking
something that didn’t belong to him.”

The case, however, was closed years later due to shortage of
evidence.