Oetzi's 'non-human' DNA
Tuesday, July 15, 2014 - 12:00
in Biology & Nature
Oetzi's human genome was decoded from a hip bone sample taken from the 5,300 year old mummy. However the tiny sample weighing no more than 0.1 g provides so much more information. A team of scientists from EURAC in Bolzano and the University of Vienna successfully analysed the non-human DNA in the sample. They found evidence for the presence of Treponema denticola, an opportunistic pathogen involved in the development of periodontal disease. The results have been published in PLOS ONE.
