Photo: David Rodriguez Munoz ~ USA TODAY NETWORK
DETROIT, May 23, 2025 ~ Two people were charged on Tuesday over an incident at the Detroit Metro Airport involving the smuggling of a fungus that can potentially cause widespread crop devastation.
Two scientists from China, Yunqing Jian, 33, and Zunyong Liu, 34, are accused of smuggling samples of the toxic fungus Fusarium graminearum into the U.S. Jian allegedly tried to smuggle the samples into the country last year from China to bring to his girlfriend Liu, a research fellow at the Molecular Plant-Microbe Interaction Laboratory at the University of Michigan.
PODCAST:
June 4, 2025 ~ A scholar from China at U-M tried to smuggle a toxic fungus into the U.S. Congressman John Moolenaar joins Kevin Dietz to discuss why he is worried about this incident.
(CONTINUED) FBI officials claimed this fungus could be used for “agroterrorism,” with the fungus able to cause diseases in crops like barley, corn, and rice. However, no evidence has been presented to support that these two scientists were planning on using these samples to target U.S. agriculture.
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