Dr. Richard Axel, a Nobel Prize-winning scientist, has announced he will step down as co-director of Columbia University Zuckerman Mind Brain Behavior Institute following renewed scrutiny over his past association with convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.
“My past association with Jeffrey Epstein was a serious error in judgment, which I deeply regret,” Axel, 79, said in a statement Tuesday. He also apologised for compromising the trust of his friends, students and colleagues, adding that the revelations about Epstein’s conduct made the association “all the more painful and inexcusable.”
Axel has not been accused of any wrongdoing in connection with Epstein, who died by suicide in August 2019 while awaiting trial on federal child sex trafficking charges. However, emails and documents released by the US Department of Justice in January showed Axel had remained in contact with Epstein and had dined with him on multiple occasions.
A faculty member at Columbia for 53 years, Axel said he will continue leading his laboratory’s research at the institute but will step down from administrative roles, including as an investigator with the Howard Hughes Medical Institute.
Axel was awarded the 2004 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine along with Linda Buck for their discoveries of odorant receptors and the organisation of the olfactory system.
In a 2007 New York magazine profile published while Epstein was facing legal trouble in Florida, Axel described him as intelligent and quick to grasp complex ideas, though he noted Epstein had a short attention span.
Columbia University said in a statement that it found no evidence Axel had violated university policy or the law. However, it said Axel believed stepping down as co-director was appropriate given the ongoing fallout from the DOJ files. The university acknowledged his significant contributions to science, students and the institution. (Agency)
