BOLZANO, ITALY, June 23 (DC Times Online) — A peer-reviewed study in the journal Microbiome has identified four cold-adapted yeast species on Ötzi the Iceman’s remains, with researchers at Eurac Research saying the 5,300-year-old mummy also carries modern contaminants under museum conditions.
The team said it reconstructed the yeasts’ genetics from samples taken from skin, meltwater inside the mummy and stomach contents. In lab work described in the study, researchers grew multiple microbe species and reported four viable ones; three were said to be able to use phenol, a compound used to prevent fungal growth, as a food source.
The researchers described Ötzi’s body as a “dynamic biological interface” in which ancient glacier-derived microbes and microbes introduced more recently coexist. In ScienceAlert’s account of the study, first author Mohamed Sarhan of Eurac Research said a mummy’s microbiome is unique because it can contain microbes more than 5,000 years old alongside modern microbes introduced after discovery.
The study also reported degraded and modern DNA fragments, which the authors said may fit with a long-term preservation history in subzero conditions. The coverage said some microbes may have been introduced during discovery or preservation, and the authors said their results are consistent with the idea that the mummy thawed and refroze more than once over thousands of years.
Ötzi was found in the Alps in 1991 and is held at the South Tyrol Museum of Archaeology in Bolzano, Italy, in a cold storage cell designed to mimic glacial conditions. The museum dates him to around 3300 BC.
