By Sheeva Azma
This article may not be appropriate for all audiences due to its discussion of various types of misconduct.
Scientists mentioned in the Epstein files have been involved in high-profile misconduct.
When I published a list of every scientist I’d found in the Epstein files, I got a few messages from people about how this was going to “ruin” innocent people’s careers.
I was shocked that these people did not think that simply appearing in the Epstein files was not already a bad scene (as we used to say in college).
In science, just like in any other job, there are bad apples. In science, that can look like behaving badly or fabricating data. Both contribute to toxic science culture.
It’s notoriously tough to report misconduct in science. An anonymous person even wrote about that in Science.
One reason is that, once a professor has tenure, the thing they’re on the hook for has to be egregious to count.
Tenure was meant to give professors academic freedom, but unfortunately, it has also led to some things that probably should not have happened…like associating with a known predator.
The Epstein files have been unique in that they have provided receipts to the discussion of scientific misconduct — whether relating to data or the way a person behaves.
That all matters in science.
Scientific misconduct among scientists who also happen to be in the Epstein files
While not directly a result of the Epstein files, Harvard just revoked tenure for the first time since the 1940s. That person, Francesca Gino, does happen to have two mentions in the Epstein files. The reason she Gino fired from Harvard was that an independent blog found that she, an honesty researcher, had faked her data.
Of her two mentions in the Epstein files, one is in Marc Hauser’s book, Evilicious, which itself is in the Epstein files — that’s probably because Hauser, formerly a Harvard professor who, himself, left Harvard due to misconduct, emailed Epstein a copy of it.
The second is a Harvard Business School report about George Whitesides’ Lab in the Harvard Chemistry Department that, according to the document, she helped prepare. Whitesides himself has 53 Epstein files mentions and, as far as I can tell, no history of scientific misconduct.
One thing that can happen when data is fabricated is that a paper published using that data is retracted, or basically un-published. In the United States, a 2025 study found that 2.8% of top-cited scientists have had a paper retracted.
However, according to a paper published in Science, 43% of people found to have engaged in academic misconduct get to keep their job.
That includes Dan Ariely, a behavioral scientist who published a now-retracted paper with Geno on dishonesty. Ariely had a second paper retracted in 2026. He has 636 Epstein files mentions.
Scientific misconduct revealed due to Epstein whistleblowers
An entire lab, the MIT Media Lab OpenAg project, was found to have engaged in data fabrication in 2019 when its Epstein ties surfaced. In this case, there were not one, but two MIT Media Lab whistleblowers that helped uncover this misconduct, relating to both the project and how it was run, and where the money was to come from for the project.
Caleb Harper, who was the principal investigator of that project before it shut down and the whole OpenAg project closed, had 162 Epstein files mentions, many of which involve coordinating meetings with Epstein and asking for funding.
Not all of the cases of scientific misconduct are so earth-shattering.
Scientific misconduct among scientists who sought to associate with Epstein
Frances Arnold (102 Epstein files mentions) is a Nobel Prize winner who attended the Mindshift Conference on Epstein’s private island in 2011. In 2020, she retracted a paper because its results were not reproducible. She emailed her friend Al Seckel about Epstein, which is in the Epstein files.
Some of the scientists in the Epstein files did actually engage in misconduct related to their relationship with Epstein. Joi Ito, former director of the MIT Media Lab, convinced MIT to allow Epstein to make seven-figure donations, even anonymously, according to the MIT report on its Epstein ties. I’m not sure what category of science misconduct that would fall under, but given that Epstein has no science degrees and he got to choose a lot of what the research directions at the Media Lab were in that era, I would be inclined to call that scientific misconduct, myself. Accepting funding from questionable billionaires apparently remains a gray area for academia, perhaps even now. It is kind of tragic for science.
Sexual misconduct among scientists mentioned in the Epstein files
Perpetrators of sexual misconduct are also well-represented in the Epstein files. Lawrence “Larry” Krauss was forced to leave his physics professorship at Arizona State University in 2018. He has 5,285 mentions in the Epstein files which include telling Epstein about taking Stephen Hawking to a strip club and getting advice from Epstein on his sexual misconduct case.
Other science folks in the Epstein files who are not the best for women in science are major players in the tech space — people like Elon Musk, who does indeed have a BA in physics and BS in economics from Wharton — who was alleged to foster a toxic environment at SpaceX. Musk has 1,122 Epstein files mentions and has been known to make degrading comments towards women on his social media platform, X.
David Sabatini is a researcher who left his prestigious role as a Howard Hughes Medical Institute researcher at MIT. When Sabatini was forced to leave MIT due to breaking the school’s sexual misconduct policy, he moved to Europe, and hedge funder Bill Ackerman gave him $25 million to continue his research. Sabatini has three Epstein files mentions for his full name and 14 for just his last name.
In one email, a man named Peter Attia hopes to connect Epstein and Sabatini. It’s unclear whether Attia, a doctor who had to leave his CBS News correspondent gig because of his deep Epstein ties (1,752 Epstein files mentions), ever introduced Sabatini to Epstein, but according to the Epstein files, he wanted to.
Indeed, it would have been the perfect alignment of toxic people.
It’s not the involvement directly with Epstein that’s the salient point here — it’s that like attracts like.
That’s the part that’s so shocking to me about the Epstein files. It’s a great way to get a quick vibe check on a person. If you look up a person and they have mentions — that is questionable and merits further examination.
Scientists alleged to have been involved in misconduct directly via Epstein ties
Don’t get me wrong, there is direct involvement alleged of some of these scientists in criminal activities, even trafficking. Marvin Minsky was alleged of sexual assault on Epstein’s private island by Virginia Giuffre. A report from House Oversight Democrats suggests that Martin Nowak, another scientist, was engaged in trafficking alongside Epstein.
Among the other scientists alleged to have run the gamut of toxic male behavior in the Epstein files are David Gelernter (who lost his teaching job at Yale over his Epstein emails), Mark Tramo (same thing, but at UCLA/Harvard), Richard Axel, and Jack Horner.
It’s unclear to me whether these emails would be actual violations of the universities’ misconduct policies — and I think that’s why these and other scientists, like economist Larry Summers, resigned voluntarily. The emails certainly garnered enough public interest to lead to the voluntary resignation of these scientists.
What does it all mean for science?
As of September 29, 2026, when I am writing this, I have found 185 scientists in the Epstein files. It’s unclear to what extent these scientists let their Epstein affiliation influence their behavior and their science (to put it lightly).
Of those scientists, a sizeable number of them have engaged in some kind of misconduct, whether it was related to their Epstein ties or not.
That should raise alarm bells. So far, however, besides prompting some scientists mentioned to resign — perhaps to prevent being investigated? — it hasn’t.
Taxpayers subsidize research in the United States. It is problematic that taxpayer-funded research is so heavily intertwined with Jeffrey Epstein. That’s not okay.
It seems clear that there is a link between Epstein files mentions and misconduct for scientists in the Epstein files
There’s way more science in the Epstein files. Follow us on Instagram, Facebook, YouTube, our blog, and Substack, for more. Check out all our blogs about science in the Epstein files here or view a list of all scientists in the Epstein files at the top of this blog.
