Former IU Postdoc Sentenced, Ordered Deported Over E. coli DNA Shipped From China in Box Labeled 'Women's Underwear'
Youhuang Xiang, a Chinese postdoctoral researcher at Indiana University, was sentenced to four-plus months in prison and stipulated to immediate removal to China after admitting he had plasmid DNA samples smuggled to his Bloomington residence inside a mislabeled package.
The U.S. Attorney's Office for the Southern District of Indiana announced Friday that Youhuang Xiang, 32, a former postdoctoral researcher in Indiana University Bloomington's Department of Biology and a citizen of the People's Republic of China, has been sentenced to more than four months in prison, a $500 fine, and one year of supervised release for smuggling biological materials into the United States. As part of Xiang's plea agreement, he stipulated to a judicial order of removal that will send him immediately to China.
What was in the package
According to court documents, the FBI's Indianapolis Division opened an investigation in November 2025 into suspicious shipments from China to people affiliated with IU. Agents tied one such parcel, received at Xiang's Bloomington residence in March 2024, to a Chinese exporter called Guangzhou Sci-Tech Innovation Trading. The shipping manifest described the contents as "Underwear of Man-Made Fibers, Other Womens."
Xiang was pulled aside by U.S. Customs and Border Protection at Chicago O'Hare on November 23, 2025, as he returned from a research trip to the United Kingdom. He initially denied any knowledge of smuggling, then admitted that the March 2024 shipping manifest had been intentionally mislabeled and that the package actually contained samples of E. coli plasmid DNA concealed to evade U.S. import controls. CBP terminated his J-1 student visa on the spot and the FBI arrested him.
CCP membership and a USDA grant
The government also disclosed that the FBI's investigation uncovered evidence Xiang was a member of the Chinese Communist Party, and that he lied about the affiliation when questioned by U.S. immigration authorities. USDA Inspector General John Walk said in a statement accompanying the plea that Xiang "exploited a federally funded research grant from USDA to smuggle dangerous biological material into the United States" — placing the case inside a broader pattern the Department of Justice has used to frame biosecurity enforcement against Chinese nationals at American research universities.
Xiang arrived in the United States on June 12, 2023, on a J-1 visa to conduct postdoctoral biology research at IU. He holds a Ph.D. from the Chinese Academy of Sciences, the country's top state-run research institution, which is overseen by the State Council.
The sentence
The sentence of "more than four months" reflects time already served since Xiang's November 2025 arrest. He was sentenced April 7, 2026, by Chief U.S. District Court Judge James R. Sweeney II. Assistant U.S. Attorney Matthew Rinka, who heads the Southern District of Indiana's National Security Unit, prosecuted. U.S. Attorney Tom Wheeler — who was sworn in earlier this year — called the conduct "a very serious threat to public safety and to the health of our agricultural economy."
The FBI Indianapolis Division, CBP, and USDA Office of Inspector General jointly investigated. The case is the latest in a run of federal prosecutions of Chinese-national researchers at U.S. universities for biological-materials smuggling, following a string of similar cases out of the Eastern District of Michigan in 2025 involving researchers at the University of Michigan.