Feb. 25 (UPI) -- Nobel Prize-winner and scientist Richard Axel announced he is resigning as co-director of Columbia University's premier interdisciplinary brain research center following recent revelations of his relationship with disgraced financier and convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.
Axel announced in a statement that he was stepping down as co-director of the Zuckerman Mind Brain Behavior Institute "to focus on research and teaching in my lab."
Several high-profile individuals have been fired, resigned and even arrested since late January when the Department of Justice released more than 3 million additional pages of information about its investigation into Epstein, who died by suicide in a Manhattan jail in 2019 while awaiting his sex trafficking trial.
The files -- and names they contain -- have drawn intense public attention, as demands for accountability grow for wealthy and well-connected associates of Epstein whose ties to him have come under renewed scrutiny.
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