New study reveals that Ötzi, the “Ice Man”, was bald and dark-skinned

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In 1991, a group of hikers found the mummified remains of Ötzi “ the Iceman ” emerging from a melting glacier in the Alps, probably murdered, judging by the remains of an arrowhead stuck in his shoulder. The mummy's genome was first sequenced in 2012, letting the world know he likely had brown eyes, type O blood, clogged arteries, Lyme disease and lactose intolerance. That first genetic analysis also determined that Ötzi was descended from steppe shepherds from Eastern Europe who migrated to the region about 4,900 years ago.

However, according to work recently published in the journal Cell Genomics , Ötzi actually has more common ancestry with the first farmers who emigrated from Anatolia about 8,000 years ago, and the earlier findings were due to mod Phone Number List ern DNA contaminating the original sample. . The authors also used the latest advanced sequencing technology to paint a more accurate picture of Iceman's appearance and other genetic traits. In particular, his skin was probably much darker than assumed and he was also bald, or nearly so, when he died.

The new findings about the “Ice Man”
Ars Technica

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Archaeologists have spent the last 30 years studying the wealth of information about life in the Copper Age that Ötzi brought with him to the present. Research has examined his genome, his skeleton, his last meals, his tattoos and the microbes that lived in his intestine. For example, in 2016, scientists used DNA sequencing to identify how Ötzi's clothing was made and found that most of it was made from domesticated cattle, goats and sheep, although his hat was made of brown bear skin and his quiver of wild deer.

A 2018 study analyzed Ötzi's tools in more detail, revealing details of his lifestyle, his final days, and the trade networks that linked distant alpine communities. Also in that year, scientists investigated the remains of Ötzi's last meal in his stomach and concluded that he followed a high-fat mountain diet, based on red deer, wild goat and whole einkorn wheat , although he may also have having accidentally eaten toxic ferns.



Given the extraordinary preservation of the body, the accepted interpretation is that Ötzi fled the valley after being attacked and froze to death in the ravine where his mummified remains were found. His body and the tools he carried were quickly buried beneath the ice and remained frozen beneath a moving glacier for the next 5,300 years. The ravine protected the remains from damage caused by the glacier.

But in 2022, scientists suggested that Ötzi died elsewhere on the mountain and that normal environmental changes gradually moved his remains into the ravine. Furthermore, during the first 1,500 years after his death, the remains may have thawed and refrozen at least once and quite possibly several times. This means that another ice mummy is much more likely to be discovered, as no extraordinary circumstances are required to explain Ötzi's preservation.