After graduation, Zhang had trouble finding an academic position. In a 2013 interview with Nautilus magazine, Zhang said he did not get a job after graduation. "During that period it was difficult to find a job in academics. That was a job market problem. Also, my advisor [Tzuong-Tsieng Moh] did not write me letters of recommendation." ... Moh claimed that Zhang never came back to him requesting recommendation letters. In a detailed profile published in The New Yorker magazine in February 2015, Alec Wilkinson wrote Zhang "parted unhappily" with Moh, and that Zhang "left Purdue without Moh's support, and, having published no papers, was unable to find an academic job".
In 2018, responding to reports of his treatment of Zhang, Moh posted an update on his website. Moh wrote that Zhang "failed miserably" in proving Jacobian conjecture, "never published any paper on algebraic geometry" after leaving Purdue, and "wasted 7 years of his [Zhang's] own life and my [Moh's] time".
All of these guys are probably a hundred times smarter than me or most of the other code monkeys working for the FANGMAN, but they're all squabbling over little 5-figure scraps of grant money.
In any dispute the intensity of feeling is inversely proportional to the value of the issues at stakeNo murderers, great success!
( Interestingly, every summary of the case in media and Wiki stops listing the evidence against him at his secretly taped confession to a girlfriend - confession that included some things absolutely not confirmed. The most convincing evidence to my eyes is the victim’s DNA in the blood found under the carpet and elsewhere there it has survived cleaning efforts. This is not mentioned anywhere except in the court recordings: https://news.wttw.com/sites/default/files/article/file-attac... . Kinda sad what is convincing these days ).
UIUC is not having a great track record wrt grad student murderers o_O
I'm glad Zhang was able to find success despite his initial setbacks and from what it seems like in his recent interviews also let go of his bitterness/resentment (holding something like that in your heart can only ever hold you back). And though the power dynamics here were clearly unequal, I don't think it's fair to blame Moh entirely for what happened at Purdue.
I think it's important to remember Moh is also human with all the complexity that comes along with that. In reading his published statement, even though there is no direct apology to Zhang, I sense that he does genuinely regret how things turned out.
Perhaps one day, Zhang and Moh will be able to meet again and resolve/rekindle their relationship.