Ranga Dias, the physicist at the centre of the room-temperature superconductivity scandal, committed data fabrication, falsification and plagiarism, according to a investigation commissioned by his university. Nature’s news team discovered the bombshell investigation report in court documents.
The 10-month investigation, which concluded on 8 February, was carried out by an independent group of scientists recruited by the University of Rochester in New York. They examined 16 allegations against Dias and concluded that it was more likely than not that in each case, the physicist had committed scientific misconduct. The university is now attempting to fire Dias, who is a tenure-track faculty member at Rochester, before his contract expires at the end of the 2024–25 academic year.
The investigation report (see Supplementary information) and numerous other documents came to light as the result of a lawsuit that Dias filed against the university in December last year. Dias submitted a grievance to Rochester over its decision to remove his students last August, but the university refused to hear the grievance on the grounds that it did “not relate to academic freedom”. The physicist’s lawsuit claims that this response was unreasonable. A university spokesperson declined to comment on the specifics of ongoing litigation and personnel matters, but emphasized that Rochester is “vigorously defending its course of action”.