For anyone excited about the possibilities of U.S.-China science collaboration, the new semiconductor at Georgia Tech is a perfect example of how globalized research drives progress. In January, physicist Walt de Heer produced the world’s first functional graphene-based semiconductor, developed mostly at a joint Georgia Institute of Technology-Tianjin University lab. He dubbed his breakthrough a “Wright brothers moment,” the birth of a next-generation material that could undergird the electronic devices of the future. For some worried about the risks of U.S.-China collaboration, however, it’s a blinking red light. After Rep. John Moolenaar (R-Mich.) took over last month as the new chair of the House China panel, the very first investigation he launched was into Georgia Tech’s graphene work. In a letter last week, he asked Georgia Tech’s president to detail its ties with China’s Tianjin University, which since 2020 has been under sanctions on a U.S. trade blacklist called the Entity List. The Commerce Department subjected the university to extra restrictions after professors there were charged in 2015 for stealing U.S. trade secrets. Is anything actually wrong? Right now it’s unclear; the Moolenar letter merely says the joint research “raises questions about Georgia Tech’s compliance with the Entity List.” Georgia Tech spokesperson Blair Meeks said it will cooperate with the inquiry and insists on strict adherence to all national security rules. The project right now is purely in research mode; even if the idea succeeds, it will be more than a decade before any graphene semiconductor is developed enough to use in a device. But the rival ways of seeing this very basic, cutting-edge project — triumph, or trojan horse for an adversary — highlight the challenges of pushing science forward in a globalized community where every technology is potentially also a competitive threat. The panel’s probe raised concerns about Georgia Tech working with Tianjin University in an area that could have “significant military applications,” such as quantum computing capabilities for advanced autonomous weapons and cyberattacks. De Heer and other experts previously told DFD it was premature even to talk about practical uses like that. Business competition is also a possible concern, especially in an area like semiconductors, which the U.S. has identified as a key venue of global competition. The emergence of a new paradigm in chip manufacturing, such as graphene semiconductors, could pose a threat by potentially allowing China to produce advanced chips with a medium that gets around U.S. export controls. This raises one important question: At what point does the rising tension between the U.S. and China, and the increasing hawkishness of Washington, start to slow down high-tech advances in a way that hurts American interests? Caroline Wagner, an Ohio State University expert on international affairs and tech policy, said the pullback is coming more from the U.S. side than from China, and she has already seen troubling outcomes. Research papers co-authored by U.S. and Chinese scientists have dropped in recent years. “That's a shame,” she told DFD. “We’re losing important connections that enrich U.S. science. I don't see the same dropoff in Europe, so I think that the dropoff has been caused by U.S. pressures on universities about security rather than it being about the science.” It might seem that very early-stage research would evade this kind of scrutiny as a threat — but Wagner points out that the line between basic science and applied research can be fuzzy, and vary drastically for different emerging technologies. As a result, policymakers have not found consensus about when to worry about a new idea. “In some areas, the space between basic research and application is really short, like pharmaceuticals or genetics, where you could go from basic chemical to a bioweapon with just a few steps,” she said. In this case, however, “there is a huge barrier to entry in terms of actually fabricating a new semiconductor and producing it.” Those nuances may be becoming less relevant. Sourabh Gupta, an international relations policy specialist at the Institute for China-America Studies, said there’s been a paradigm shift in the U.S. since Trump labeled China a strategic “competitor” in his first 2017 national security strategy. It continued into the Biden administration, with National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan designating computing-related technologies (which include chips, artificial intelligence, and quantum) as so-called force multipliers, meaning each could significantly boost China’s military. “He said, these next 10 years are our critical years, and we plan to keep as big a lead as possible, not just be one generation ahead,” Gupta said. “And what he didn't say was also try to suppress the Chinese in trying to catch up.” Researchers are currently waiting to see if the two countries will renew a historic agreement that has facilitated research collaboration between them for decades. It was set to expire in August 2023, then was extended by Beijing and Washington to allow for six months of negotiations. “They're trying to limit it and narrow it down significantly, so that it's not going to be science and technology across the board,” said Gupta. His read of Moolenaar’s letter is that it appeared more concerned about Georgia Tech’s particular area of research than its actual conduct. Gupta expects this new, more restrictive kind of thinking to ramp up with the election, as the Biden administration locks down tough-on-China rules, and continue regardless of the outcome. As evidence, he pointed out that late last week (in an update that will publish tomorrow), the Commerce Department added more Chinese firms and institutes to the Entity List, some for aiding Beijing’s quantum computing efforts. “Basically, any advancing computing capabilities will be deemed to have some element of military application. And it doesn't matter if it is an academic or research institute and if that research has immediate commercial applicability or not. Better to be safe than sorry,” Gupta said.
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