The key part is:

> Last year, a Chinese national who was a research professor at Kansas State University was arrested and sentenced to 10 years in federal prison for stealing valuable American rice seeds — a trade secret — that can be used to treat gastrointestinal disease, antibiotic-associated diarrhea, hepatic disease, osteoporosis and inflammatory bowel disease.

This was a trade secret.

Theft of trade secrets is covered in 18 U.S. Code § 1832 - https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/1832

> Whoever, with intent to convert a trade secret, that is related to a product or service used in or intended for use in interstate or foreign commerce, to the economic benefit of anyone other than the owner thereof, and intending or knowing that the offense will, injure any owner of that trade secret, knowingly ... steals, or without authorization appropriates, takes, carries away, or conceals, or by fraud, artifice, or deception obtains such information; ... shall, except as provided in subsection (b), be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than 10 years, or both.

> Any organization that commits any offense described in subsection (a) shall be fined not more than the greater of $5,000,000 or 3 times the value of the stolen trade secret to the organization, including expenses for research and design and other costs of reproducing the trade secret that the organization has thereby avoided.

Economic espionage is in § 1831 - https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/1831

which reads much the same... though has a slight difference in subsection a.1. :

> Whoever, intending or knowing that the offense will benefit any foreign government, foreign instrumentality, or foreign agent, knowingly

> ...

> shall, except as provided in subsection (b), be fined not more than $5,000,000 or imprisoned not more than 15 years, or both.

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http://www.mondaq.com/unitedstates/x/739680/Trade+Secrets/Re... has recent prosecutions

https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/chinese-national-sentenced-ec... has one at 5 years for theft of source code.

The difference between the 5 and 10 years is likely related to the amount of investment in the trade secret and the degree of trust placed in that individual (one of six people).

https://www.justice.gov/usao-ndia/pr/former-dupont-employee-...

> On the same day Isler accepted a position with the competitor, the competitor’s Chief Operating Officer (COO) informed Isler that Isler would be servicing two particular ethanol plant customers, who had also been customers of DuPont, and asked Isler if he had seen “any baseline data” for those plants. Isler responded by stating, “let me see what I can before I can’t.” In a later message that day, the COO told Isler, “I think you made the right choice.”

> Isler submitted his resignation letter to DuPont the following day. However, Isler did not leave DuPont until two weeks later. During the intervening two weeks, Isler downloaded and sent to the competitor numerous electronic files that contained proprietary and trade secret information of DuPont. This included test, yield, and pricing information for products and customers of DuPont.

There you have three and a half years in prison and supervision for another three years for test, yield and pricing data.