WATCH: 60 Minutes Profiles Temple Prof Wrongly Accused of Spying

Last May, the Department of Justice dropped a bombshell when it announced charges against Temple physics chair Xiaoxing Xi. The allegation: The Chinese-born scientist was alleged to be passing top-secret technology — something called a “pocket heater” — along to China. He was demoted from his position at Temple and generally shamed. Then, four months later, the DOJ quietly, and with no explanation, dropped the charges against him. According to the New York Times, federal prosecutors didn’t understand the science. Whoops!

Last night, nearly one year after federal agents with guns and bulletproof vests barged into his home around sunrise and handcuffed him, 60 Minutes profiled Xi and Sherry Chen, another Chinese-born scientist accused and then cleared of spying for China in a segment called “Collateral Damage.”

Along with describing his early-morning encounter with the federal government, Xi talks with reporter Bill Whitaker about the science the U.S. thought he was sharing and the science he was actually working on. Notably, he details that the collaboration with Chinese scientists that prosecutors were so interested in was actually mandated by a National Science Foundation grant that was funding his work.

In a web-extra segment, Xi, an American citizen, says that stopping Chinese economic espionage is indeed important for America, but that bungled cases like his and Chen’s aren’t helping the cause: “These kinds of cases do not advance this goal, it hurts this goal.”

Asked by Whitaker if he feels he’s owed anything by the U.S. Government in the aftermath, Xi explains. “I didn’t do anything wrong but my family and myself had to go through this. I think we deserve some kind of apology. And, you know, it’s not over, right. The scars from this traumatic experience is so deep that it’s going to be with us for the rest of our life.”