Program for Evolutionary Dynamics

The Program for Evolutionary Dynamics (PED) was a research center of Harvard University devoted to mathematical models of evolution, cooperation, cancer and infectious disease. It was created in 2003 with a 6.5 million dollar gift from Jeffrey Epstein, the largest he made to Harvard, and was directed from its founding by the mathematical biologist Martin Nowak. After Epstein's 2008 conviction the program kept an office for his use, gave him keycard and passcode access, hosted more than forty of his visits, and posted a page about him on its harvard.edu website. Harvard announced the program's closure in March 2021.¹²

Founding and Structure

PED's own website described the program as "established in 2003 by Harvard University President Lawrence H. Summers following an imaginative proposal by Jeffrey Epstein and Benedict Gross," operating "under the auspices of William Kirby, Dean of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences," with Nowak as faculty director. Harvard recruited Nowak from the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, where Epstein had already supported his work. Epstein's unrestricted 6.5 million dollar gift allowed Harvard and Nowak to lease a separate research facility in a private Harvard Square office building at One Brattle Square, where the Harvard Kennedy School held the lease and sublet a floor to PED. The Harvard Crimson and other outlets reported at the time that the gift was part of a 30 million dollar pledge; Harvard's 2020 review found no Harvard record of any such pledge.¹³

The program described "evolutionary dynamics" as "the study of the fundamental mathematical principles that guide evolution" and listed as current topics the evolution of cooperation, cancer, viruses, evolutionary game and graph theory, prelife, protocells, eusociality, evolution of language and evolutionary economics. Its 2021 homepage stated: "Our ambitious goals include curing the world of cancer, infectious disease, selfishness, and inclusive fitness theory." PED ran Harvard's undergraduate course Math 153, "Mathematical Biology: Evolutionary Dynamics," and graduate students and postdoctoral fellows trained there included Corina Tarnita, Erez Lieberman Aiden, Franziska Michor and David G. Rand. Its later work included a paper by PED researchers Chuck Noble and Ben Adlam with Nowak, the Harvard geneticist George Church and Kevin Esvelt warning against field trials of CRISPR gene drives.⁴⁵

When Epstein was arrested in 2006, Harvard declined to return the gift. A university spokesman told the Crimson on September 13, 2006: "Mr. Epstein's gift is funding important research using mathematics to study areas such as evolutionary dynamics, viruses, and cancers. The University is not considering returning this gift." Interim President Derek Bok referred the paper to his 1979 open letter, which held that Harvard would generally accept money from donors who had earned it immorally "on the ground that the tangible benefits of using the money . . . should overcome the more abstract, symbolic considerations."¹⁶

The Office, the Visits and the Access Cards

After his 2009 release, Epstein held no Harvard appointment, but PED maintained Office 610, which staff called "Jeffrey's Office." Epstein brought his own rug, hung his own photographs, and had a Harvard telephone line in the room until 2017, when PED removed it "as a cost-cutting measure." Before 2017 Nowak authorized PED to issue Epstein and his assistants proximity cards to the building, the keypad passcode to the program's suite, and a key to Office 610. Harvard's review counted likely visits by year: four in 2010, five in 2011, two in 2012, three in 2013, four in 2014, eight in 2015, nine in 2016, five in 2017 and six in 2018, the last in October 2018. Epstein chose the dates and generally set the guest lists, met academics from other institutions at least as often as Harvard faculty, occasionally brought political figures, and was "routinely accompanied" by young women in their twenties described as assistants. The visits ended only after PED researchers complained to Nowak.⁷

In 2017 Harvard installed a card-reader system requiring Harvard identification for unaccompanied entry. The rules allowed Nowak or PED's Chief Administrative Officer to sponsor a temporary guest identification, which required attesting that the visitor had "a legitimate business, research or education reason" and having the visitor photographed. The administrator instead asked Harvard security for "unassigned access cards for our short term visitors," sent two of them by Federal Express to an Epstein assistant, and told Nowak she had done so because it was "easier than arranging a temporary [identification] Card which would have to be annually renewed and Jeffrey would have to have [a] photo taken." Nowak did not reply. The review concluded that the administrator, "with Professor Nowak on notice, circumvented Harvard's efforts to tighten . . . security procedures and permitted Epstein to continue to have unfettered access."⁷

The artificial-intelligence researcher Joscha Bach, whom Epstein introduced to Nowak in 2014 and whose position at the MIT Media Lab Epstein subsidized, was listed as a PED research scientist from 2014 to 2019 and kept PED office space, though Harvard never paid him and he never signed a Visitor Participation Agreement. Bach often met Epstein at PED, and at least two papers he published after leaving MIT acknowledged support from Epstein and PED.⁷⁸

Epstein used the suite for meetings with a circle he called "the boys" and for dinner parties organized by Nowak's assistants, including Lawrence Summers's sixtieth-birthday celebration. The lab administrator arranged food and his companions' building access. Photographs from a 2012 lunch at Nowak's office, posted on an Epstein foundation website, showed Epstein with Leon Black, George Church, the Broad Institute director Eric Lander, the Harvard Kennedy School professor and presidential adviser David Gergen, the MIT physicist Seth Lloyd, the cognitive scientist Howard Gardner, the placebo researcher Ted Kaptchuk and the former Faculty of Arts and Sciences dean Henry Rosovsky. Lander said Nowak "didn't mention who'd be attending"; Kaptchuk said "the meeting was weird" and that he ended contact once told of Epstein's record; Gardner said he had no memory of it. Church's online calendar recorded a further 2014 meeting with Epstein at the institute.⁹¹⁰

The Donors After the Ban

President Drew Faust decided no later than November 2008 that Harvard would accept no further gifts from Epstein, but recorded the decision nowhere and did not formally notify Nowak. PED had used Epstein's unrestricted gift to pay its rent, which conventional research grants could not cover, and the money was spent by about 2007. Between 2010 and 2014 Nowak and others sought to reopen the question; in December 2013 the mathematics chair Benedict Gross and the divisional dean Jeremy Bloxham asked Dean Michael D. Smith to petition the Gift Policy Committee, writing that "Epstein has served his time for his crime, and that his wealth has been obtained legally." Smith declined. Gross told Nowak in March 2014 that there was "a temporary hold on contributions from Jeffrey Epstein, although I hope it will be lifted by summer," and in December 2014 Nowak asked Gross "confidentially" whether there was "an update concerning Jeffrey being an acceptable donor for Harvard?"¹¹

In the same period donors whom Epstein introduced paid PED's rent. Nowak acknowledged that he had no prior relationship with any of them:¹²

Epstein's accountant and staff acted as intermediaries, and at Nowak's direction ensured that the Black gift letters earmarked the money for Nowak's research and expressly permitted its use for rent at One Brattle Square. In May 2014 Nowak wrote to Epstein: "our current lease ends on 30 June 2015 . . . it would be good to get something this summer. We could then extend our lease until 2017." Harvard development staff thanked Epstein's accountant in December 2014 ("please let Mr. Epstein know that we are so grateful for him for trying to expedite this gift") and in February 2017 asked Nowak to "reach out to [the Blacks or Epstein] again soon." Epstein had been one of seven trustees of the Black Family Foundation from its creation in 1997; Black's representative told Harvard's investigators that Epstein resigned in July 2007 "at the family's request," that "none of the funds were provided by Mr. Epstein," and that "no attempt was made to conceal the source of these gifts." A Falconwood representative likewise said its gift was its own money. Over 2012 to 2017, the years of the Black gifts to PED, Black paid Epstein about 158 million dollars for tax and estate advice.¹²¹³

The Templeton Letter

In 2014 PED applied to the John Templeton Foundation, on whose Board of Advisors Nowak sat, for a 3 million dollar grant. Templeton offered half and required proof that matching funds were secured. PED held Black money that could have served, but Nowak sought a letter from Epstein. Epstein wrote to his accountant and Nowak, "im not sure if [an Epstein foundation] should sign instead," and separately emailed a Templeton executive vice president, "martin wants to send a letter showing funds but using my name, i thought you might have a view"; the executive replied, "Sure, just send me a draft if you like." The letter that followed, from Epstein's Virgin Islands foundation Enhanced Education, stated that "[i]n 2003 Enhanced Education established a gift to the Program for Evolutionary Dynamics." Enhanced Education had never funded PED and Epstein's 2003 money was long spent. Templeton granted 1.5 million dollars in 2015. In 2018 the administrator instructed a researcher filling in the close-out form to write, "We used a gift from Enhanced Education to Harvard University fund 347150 for the Program for Evolutionary Dynamics." Harvard's review found that Nowak and the administrator "provided false information to the Templeton Foundation," and that Templeton "has no record of this statement in its files."¹⁴

The Website and the Publicist

In mid-2013 Epstein's publicist, "in charge of Jeffrey's media/pr," wrote to one of Nowak's assistants: "Jeffrey is trying to boost his foundation's websites and a link on Harvard's network would be very helpful." With Nowak's approval PED linked to two Epstein foundation sites, one of which, jeffreyepstein.org, stated that Epstein's foundation "established the Program for Evolutionary Dynamics at Harvard University with a $35 million gift to the university." Press releases from the Jeffrey Epstein VI Foundation between 2012 and 2014 gave the figure as 30 million dollars; a Harvard source told BuzzFeed News the figure "does not reflect the actual gift." The publicist also asked Nowak to review an article she had written about Epstein, which ran on the website of National Review, repeated the 35 million dollar figure, and was later removed.¹⁵¹⁶¹⁷

In 2014, while Nowak was seeking money to keep the lease, the publicist asked for a full page because "it would be very helpful in terms of Google results if his name were attached to a Harvard.edu url." PED posted a page with Epstein's photograph, a biography and links under a tab labeled "Friends," on which "Jeffrey Epstein" was the only entry. The administrator told investigators she and Nowak had planned to remove the links quietly once the publicist had confirmed them; PED took the page down once and restored it after the publicist complained. In March 2014 an anti-trafficking organization wrote to Faust objecting to "almost daily press releases" from "a pedophile [who] feels entitled to identify himself as a 'Harvard philanthropist.'" PED removed the page after sexual-assault survivor advocates contacted it and the president's office in October 2014. In a separate 2012 exchange, a person whose name is redacted in the Justice Department release told Epstein that press releases about Nowak's work and Epstein's funding had been placed with major outlets as part of an effort to displace "the bad stuff" from the first page of search results; Epstein replied that "ther[e] should be an article a day or every two days."¹⁵¹⁸¹⁹

In May 2019, after the Miami Herald series and before Epstein's arrest, Nowak wrote to Epstein's assistant asking that all references to the lab be removed from Epstein's website: "The sooner the better please . . . Things are getting very strange here."²⁰

Review and Closure

Harvard President Lawrence Bacow ordered a review in September 2019. The report, by General Counsel Diane Lopez with Martin Murphy of Foley Hoag, released May 1, 2020, referred Nowak and the administrator for possible discipline over Epstein's access, the website and the Templeton representations. On March 26, 2021, Faculty of Arts and Sciences Dean Claudine Gay sanctioned Nowak and announced that PED would close and that his research would move to the mathematics department. The report mentioned Summers once; in February 2026, after further Justice Department releases, Summers resigned from Harvard and Nowak was placed on leave a second time.¹²⁰²¹