This story has been updated with comment from the university.
The US Department of Agriculture has concluded its investigation into the lab of IU biology professor Roger Innes.
Aside from an expired import permit, a missing curation permit and some unapproved house plants, the department found nothing during its search Monday violating federal guidelines.
The lab was missing a permit it needed to keep a plant pathogen for several years after importing it, but the lab is still permitted to work with that species. The USDA destroyed those petri dishes. Some organisms they were unable to identify were also destroyed.
“No fines, no penalties. The lab is opened again,” Innes said. “The biggest loss is they required us to destroy all of the house plants that we had decorating the windowsills in our lab. So, there's going to be many sad people in my lab tomorrow morning when they discover their house plants are gone.”
IU Vice President for Research Russ Mumper said in an email to biology faculty: "Following their review, the USDA informed Dr. Innes that certain materials he had identified could be retained, but that some materials classified as 'unknown', regulated materials that lacked required permits, or regulated materials that were part of lapsed permits were required to be destroyed by the agencies. Only materials from the Innes Lab were destroyed and no scientific materials from other researchers were impacted."
The investigation and shutdown drew considerable attention because of Innes’s defense of Chinese researchers convicted of illegally importing research material. His own employee Youhuang Xiang was deported after mislabeling a shipment of DNA plasmids, and his lab came under scrutiny by the FBI. Some colleagues and media outlets have speculated that the search was a form of retribution.
Innes said he has not had any communication recently with other federal agencies.
“It was clear that USDA was acting upon the request of other people in the government,” Innes said. “They weren't free to talk about that at all, but one of the things they did say is that their concerns are about the spread of pests or pathogens. They really have very little concern of that happening from research labs like ours, because we have some tight controls over what gets out of the lab. Usually, their concerns are like nurseries and markets and whatnot. So, this was unusual for them to spend a whole day inspecting a lab like this.”
IU locked down several adjacent labs before erecting a barrier which allowed partial access for other scientists. That barrier came down Tuesday afternoon.
Losing lab access for two weeks set back research projects back by several months, according to Innes.
