In the original text, for the sake of brevity, I primarily highlighted the conflicts between myself and Prof. Yigal Achmon, simplifying the details of how he earned my trust. Here, I am writing a separate article to analyze the basic tactics he used to gain trust from others.
I met Prof. Yigal Achmon at GTIIT in 2018. At that time, he just joined GTIIT as an assistant professor. In April 2020, I was hospitalized due to illness. As a result, I missed most of the final exams and fell behind in many courses. My health was poor, and starting in October 2020, I began staying off-campus. In November 2020, I missed an introductory lecture of a lab course. Prof. Yigal Achmon was nominally in charge of that course. In fact, he gave only the introductory lecture, and the subsequent lab classes was in charge of a lab manager. Prof. Yigal Achmon spent about fifteen minutes in his office giving me a makeup lecture. Although it was not a major issue, but he was not obligated to help, many professors at GTIIT might not help in this situation. I was very grateful to him and learned his field of research, which involves soil pest control. Since my father works in forest pest control, which has similarities to soil pest control, I wrote an email in December expressing my interest in joining his lab. We both became very busy afterwards and did not keep in touch.
In March 2021, I contacted Prof. Yigal Achmon again. At that time, he was in Israel, and we had several zoom meetings. He said he wanted me to do something to show my ability. At the end of March, 2021, I sent him a review on biosolarization, but he did not reply. Around the same time, I reanalyzed some of his previous published research data and presented the results to him in a video zoom meeting, which he recognized positively. During the meeting, he suggested that I could participate in a research course for credit and promised to give me a high grade. At that time, I felt he was sincere and had a concept of fair exchange. I understood it as me doing some bioinformatics analysis for him, and in return, he would offer me a research course that could boost my GPA and provide extra credits to meet graduation requirements. I did not realize that the research course would increase his power over me and become a tool for extortion. I thought the research course was purely a way for him to help me improve my GPA and credits.
In early April, he sent me many documents, including a excel metabolomics dataset from a biosolarization experiment using tomato pomace as amendment, conducted in California in 2016. I guessed that this dataset was from the West Coast Metabolomics Center, one of the best gas chromatography centers in the world. I was very interested, confirmed relevant details with him, and conducted the analysis. By mid-May 2021, I submitted a preliminary analysis report that included pathway analysis using SolCyc, functional analysis using KEGG, microbiome analysis using QIIME2, functional analysis of microbial communities using PICRUSt2, and related network analyses. These reports helped him clarify the current research situation and determine the next research directions. In the report, I suggested requesting the original mass spectrometry data from the West Coast Metabolomics Center for reanalysis to achieve better results.
At the end of May 2021, I had a video meeting with Prof. Yigal Achmon and his colleague Prof. Nir Sade. During the meeting, I asked Prof. Nir Sade, “In this dataset, the differences of some metabolites between the biosolarization group and the control group is significant, but the fold changes are relatively small. Could this be problematic?” Prof. Nir Sade replied, “This is not an issue. We are more concerned with significance because we used a relatively low concentration of salt. If we used a higher concentration, the changes would be more pronounced.” That was the main part of my conversation with Prof. Nir Sade. I didn’t have any talk with other colleagues of Prof. Yigal Achmon. Subsequently, Prof. Nir Sade consulted the West Coast Metabolomics Center, successfully obtained the relevant mass spectrometry data, and sent it to me.
Shortly after the video meeting at the end of May, Prof. Yigal Achmon mentioned in another conversation that he and Nir had decided that I was responsible for all the writing and data analysis for the tomato biosolarization paper and it was a summer project, and since I would be doing most of the work, I would be the first author. Although the data analysis was somewhat complex, being directly assigned as the first author was slightly above average (usually, in average cases, my work deserves the second or second-to-last author). This further increased my favorable impression of him.
Before leaving Shantou in mid-June 2021, Prof. Yigal Achmon asked if I could teach a bioinformatics course to his lab’s students during the summer. I mentioned that I had to write papers and did not have much time. He implied that I could be a co-corresponding author. Given the previously offered first author, I thought the conditions were excellent and agreed. After the conversation, I felt a bit embarrassed, thinking how to suggest being the second co-first co-corresponding author later.
In July 2021, I was unwell and had multiple hospital visits, which prevented me from efficiently completing all works as planned during the summer. In September 2021, I sent Prof. Yigal Achmon a syllabus for a bioinformatics course titled “Community Analysis of Microbiota,” but due to subsequent busy schedules, the course was never officially conducted. Prof. Yigal Achmon often pushed me, but each time he did, he used very nice words, such as “I am always on your side”, “you are smart and you can finish that quickly”. Thus, I hurried to complete the tasks, not feeling that his pushing were problematic. I also understood his difficulties with his upcoming tenure review in summer, 2022.
From March to October 2021, during those six months, he was very tactful in his speech and made verbal promises of very favorable conditions. These conditions were almost the best he could offer. Even though he made several mistakes that led me to realize that I might suffer losses (mainly reputational, such as whether people would associate his blunders with me), I did not terminate the collaboration, taking into account his apparent sincerity at the time. I tried to de-risks by keeping a distance with him to minimize potential losses (for example, although he asked me to join his lab, I did not sign any documents, nor process any procedures, nor attend his group meetings). I believed diversity, and, despite disagreeing with some of his actions, believed it did not affect our continued collaboration.
Even now, looking back, my response at that time was not a major issue because Prof. Yigal Achmon disguised himself very well. If I had terminated the collaboration just because of a few mistakes, it would have seemed petty.
In mid-November 2021, Prof. Yigal Achmon invited a businessman to give a lecture at GTIIT about using AI to predict changes in soil microbiota. After listening to his presentation, I found that this businessman had many fundamental misconceptions about microbiota. Prof. Yigal Achmon believed the businessman had his strengths in computing. That night, I explained to Prof. Yigal Achmon until dawn, pointing out that using AI to predict soil microbiota changes was similar to AI predictions of human gut microbiota changes, and only then did he realize that the businessman was unreliable. The next afternoon, when I met him, he said, “You’d better complete the tomato paper before the end of this year and publish it before graduation. It is related to your research course. If you cannot publish it, the committee may ask some very difficult questions, which could affect your graduation.” Then he added, “After you graduate, you will go to a very good university. You will be very busy, you won’t have time.”
This was his first direct threat. The statement was very problematic because the course was only a research course for undergraduates, which only required submitting a report and giving a presentation; there was no publication requirement, and many students do not publish papers. Furthermore, the research course was an elective course, not a mandatory one, so it would only affect my total credits but not my ability to graduate as long as I had enough credits. However, I felt he was worried about his tenure review and somewhat understood his anxiety. I told him that as long as the sequencing quality for his microbiome project was good, I could quickly help with the analysis and find a fast-review journal for publication. Regarding the tomato paper, I judged that publishing it within six months was challenging due to the typical long review times for agricultural papers. Prof. Yigal Achmon didn’t show disagreement after I said those words.
Later, Dr. Alex Samusev expelled me from a food microbiology lab course. When I sought help from Prof. Yigal Achmon, he started to directly show his bad side. During one meeting, I said I would teach his students and that the data analyses didn’t require a high level of skills, so he didn’t need to worry too much about my graduation. I then changed the topic, asking what position he would have if I were the first author and whether he would be the second-to-last author. I was a bit puzzled by his attitude and wondered if he had any dissatisfaction or wanted something from me. If that were the case, I could make concessions, as graduation was the most important thing. He said he would be the last author. I then suggested co-first author was also acceptable, and he said, “We (with Nir) decided, you will be the co-first author.” Noticed that half a year ago, his condition was an independent first author position with a co-corresponding author role in exchange for teaching his students, but when I raised the issue, even the previously clearly agreed independent first author was gone. Nonetheless, if not teaching, the situation was still fair (usually a co-first author). The additional teaching make it slightly unfair, but I felt constrained by the situation and did not make a fuss. I considered this disadvantage as part of the conditions for him helping me resolve the lab course issue.
After that, he completely mashed me into a corner. On one hand, he claimed that the matter had nothing to do with him (he is the professor who is responsible for that course) and that Dr. Alex Semusev was difficult to negotiate with. On the other hand, he hinted that if I provided him with more favorable conditions, there might still be a chance (he proposed many seemingly possible ways, e.g., further talked with Dr. Alex Semusev, asking for the Dean for help, etc.). His altitute, saying that it is difficult, but still possible, makes me promise him additional conditions, such as I had a paper about database and he could do some experiments. He then introduced a project under JGI for organizing microbial datasets for metadata to me and said that I could design next year’s field experiments.
From this, it is clear that when he negotiates deals, even when it involves extortion, he never makes it look like outright blackmail. Instead, he presents it as a fair exchange, though it’s essentially a matter of trading pennies for pounds. However, in academia, where people are not deeply involved in the field, it’s challenging to distinguish between academic “pennies” and “pounds.” Other people might think it is better than “getting something for nothing”.
However, I judged that the metadata design project would be impossible to publish, as similar projects had already been published in Nature sub-journals and top microbiology journals, led by EMBI (in fact, it still hasn’t been published after three years). I also did not believe that he had the ability to conduct field experiments in 2022 (and indeed, he has not published any field experiment papers even now, three years later). In reality, these things were not even “pennies,” but pure negative assets, though he genuinely believed in them at the time. Judging whether a project can be published requires a high level of academic skill, which he lacked. So, indeed, it is much worse than “getting something for nothing”.
Eventually, after being satisfied, he promised to help me resolve the issue. I told him that even if there were other issues his students couldn’t handle, I could take care of them, and if I didn’t have time, I could recommend others. He, being the supervising professor of that food microbiology lab course, had the capability to resolve issues. But in the end, all the other students passed, only I was expelled from that course after completing more than half of the course.
I want to make it clear. The key issue is that, Prof. Yigal Achmon said he could help me after I was expelled from the lab course and asked me for many things, while I followed his suggestions and he promised to help me, while in fact he even said some bad words to Dr. Alex Semusev to let him more angry to me.
My experience illustrates that Prof. Yigal Achmon’s basic tactics for gaining trust in collaboration is to initially conceal his unfavorable conditions and promise above-average conditions to induce others to do work beyond the average. Once the task is completed, he shirks responsibility and reverts to average conditions, leaving others unhappy but could hardly say anything (you already did the work, and the conditions are seemingly fair if without those work). Simultaneously, he repeatedly sets traps to gain more power. Once he has power, he continually uses it for extortion, but during the extortion process, he offers some straw as a guise of fairness. In practice, due to his extremely limited professionality, the so-called straw he offers is usually a negative asset.
Repeatedly setting traps to gain more power, concealing unfavorable conditions, going back on promises, shirking responsibility, extortion, and pretending to offer fair exchanges are his core tactics.
After the end of 2021, I stopped contacting him proactively. However, from January to May 2022, he contacted me multiple times, subtly or explicitly suggesting whether I was willing to continue collaborating with him, which I politely declined. Immediately after, he began planning to kill me.
In July 2023, after realizing a series of illegal and criminal actions against me, he first proposed a condition: if I deleted our chat records, he would stop. I actually believed him at the time and deleted the records. He then told me, “Everything I did was for your own good.” In reality, he immediately spread rumors to PNAS. In mid-August 2023, he again said he could directly offer me a degree if I complied with certain conditions, mainly deleting more chat records. I also believed him at that time and further cooperated by deleting more records. Afterward, he immediately turned against me, claiming that this had nothing to do with me, and that only certain people had the power. He then said he could “help” me with experiments, pretending it was a fair exchange, but his own experiments were of extremely poor quality. When he realized he couldn’t plagiarize my paper or kill me, he announced that he had abandoned his attempts at plagiarism and murder. In fact, the tactics he used from July 2023 to June 2024 were essentially the same as those he used during the eight months of 2021.
From what I understand, he encourages others to plagiarize using similar tactics. His main logic is that since I’ve stolen a lot of things, I could be arrested at any time, and since my moral value is low and I am weak in ability, plagiarizing my work is completely reasonable and without any danger.
Of course, he is very aware that these logics are completely false. First, from June to September 2022, he conducted a detailed investigation on me and found no criminal issues that could accuse me. Otherwise, he would have directly expelled me with those issues and did not need to fabricate such rediculous rumors. My moral value is much higher compared to the average in any social group. As for my abilities being weak, that’s even more rediculous. He has tried to kill me for over two years, deploying so many resources, yet hasn’t succeeded. As a selfish person, if my abilities were truly weak, why couldn’t he just plagiarize my papers himself? Why make others do it? In fact, by June 2023, he knew I had full support from Peter Bickel, and he was very aware that the Chinese government wouldn’t support him. While he may have underestimated the difficulty of killing me and plagiarizing my papers, he was somewhat aware of it. However, he completely concealed these unfavorable conditions. He then enticed others to plagiarize my papers, and when it failed, he shifted the blame to me. His tactics are essentially the same, traps to gain more power, concealing unfavorable conditions, breaking promises, shirking responsibility, extortion, and pretending to offer fair exchanges. Moreover, due to his limited judgment, he fails to realize that much of what he “gives” to others is actually a negative asset.
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