Suicide

Kaustuv Basu: Zeeshan Usmani waited weeks to meet with the professor.

Finally, face to face in a cramped office, the 31-year-old Pakistani grasped for words to explain the research that would cap his five years of study at Florida Tech.

He nervously blurted out the idea for his doctoral thesis: Build a computer model to simulate how suicide bombs explode.

Startled, professor Daniel Kirk leaned forward and took a deep breath. Why did this young Pakistani scholar want to know more about terror bombings? If there was one topic this student could choose to make life difficult for himself in the United States, this was it, the professor thought.

Kirk was right. Red flags go up at the mere mention of Usmani's research. The FBI called the student and the professor.