[photochemsyn]

On this, I think you'd want to look more broadly at whether the superstar's university had people on the grant committee at the respective funding institution:

> "Well, we can say it’s not simply a case of these dominant researchers vetoing grant proposals and publication from rival researchers. Only a tiny fraction of them were in positions of formal academic power, such as sitting on NIH grant review committees or serving as journal editors, when they passed away. So what else could it be?"

That's not really how those clubs work; they get their old friends and pals to do the dirty work.