It would be difficult for an unknown individual or unknown/untrusted organisation.
It's less difficult for a respected university willing to sacrifice its reputation.
The patches for the study were submitted from Gmail addresses. It wasn't tied to the university and didn't even use university email addresses. I don't know why people keep repeating this misinformation, including kernel developers.
That's not one of the emails involved in the study. It was an inaccurate claim. I suggest not spreading misinformation and libel.
Kernel maintainers being dishonest and misrepresenting good faith patches from students as part of a past study makes the project look bad.
Again, the patches involved in that study were submitted from Gmail addresses. The study is a past event. You're linking a recent patch from a student not involved in it. It's misinformation and is dishonest. It is making Linux look increasingly bad in this situation, not better.
I suggest doing basic research into what happened before making accusations that a student submitted patches in bad faith and that they're lying about it.
Damage done to the project from this situation is primarily caused by the misinformation and dishonesty from maintainers.