BOLZANO, ITALY, June 23 (DC Times Online) — A study published in the peer-reviewed journal Microbiome says researchers identified four cold-adapted yeast species on Ötzi the Iceman, the 5,300-year-old mummy found in the Alps near the Austria-Italy border in 1991.
The Eurac Research team said traces of the yeasts appeared in skin samples, meltwater inside the mummy and stomach contents. The authors said the remains may act as a “dynamic biological interface,” where ancient glacier microbes and modern contaminants coexist under museum conditions.
The researchers also reported degraded and modern DNA fragments. They said that evidence leaves open the possibility that some microbes were introduced during discovery or preservation, while other findings fit the idea that microbes could have survived repeated freezing and thawing over thousands of years.
In laboratory work, the team said it grew several microbe species and recovered four viable yeasts. Three of the yeasts were reportedly able to use phenol, a compound used to prevent fungal growth, as a food source.
Ötzi is kept in a cold cell at the South Tyrol Museum of Archaeology in Bolzano, Italy. The museum says radiocarbon dating places him in the Copper Age, around 3350 to 3105 B.C.
The museum says the body was naturally preserved in glacier ice, and that analysis suggests Ötzi was killed by an arrow that severed a major artery.
