The chain of events that ultimately led to Wu’s departure began in the summer of 2017, when the FBI notified the cancer center it was investigating “the possible theft of MD Anderson research and proprietary information.” (MD Anderson declined to speak about the FBI investigation except to say it did not report theft of intellectual property to the bureau.) A federal grand jury followed up with a subpoena for five years of emails from some MD Anderson employees. A few months later, the center gutted its international research program and put what was left of its collaborative-project arm under a business department.