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Experts from three institutions have pooled their skills in order to map Ötzi's entire genetic make-up: Albert Zink, Head of the EURAC Institute for Mummies and the iceman, together with Carsten Pusch, from the Institute of Human Genetics at the University of Tübingen and Andreas Keller from the bio-technological firm "febit" in Heidelberg. Together they have reached a historic moment in the study of the 5,000 year old mummy. The two scientists, Zink and Pusch, have been working together for some time and recently published, in collaboration with the Egyptian team led by Zahi Hawass, the latest findings on the...

In the year 3289 BC, Otzi trekked up the Schnalstal glacier in the Italian Alps. The Neolithic guy -- dubbed Otzi the Iceman, or Frozen Fritz -- wore a coat and leggings made of sheep's fur and moccasins made of cattle leather as he climbed, having just polished off his last meal: unleavened bread and meat. Severely wounded by an arrow and possibly dispatched with a blow to the head by a cudgel, he died, his body froze and was mummified, and he lay in place for a very, very long time.

Ötzi the ice mummy may have met his death in the Alps some 5300 years ago, but his descendants live on – on the Mediterranean islands of Corsica and Sardinia. The finding comes from an analysis of Ötzi's DNA, which also reveals he had brown eyes and hair, and was lactose intolerant. The ice mummy was found in 1991 on an Alpine glacier between Austria and Italy, where he met a violent end in the Neolithic.....

As cold cases go, it does not get much colder than Ötzi the Iceman, whose body was found frozen solid in the Italian Alps 5,300 years after he died from an arrow wound. Since he was discovered by trekkers in 1991, scientists have mapped his DNA and figured out everything from what ailments he suffered from (Lyme disease and a weak heart) to the last meal he ate (venison and ibex) before he was shot in the back, probably by an enemy tribesman. Now, using advanced nanotechnology, they have located traces of Ötzi's blood, the oldest blood sample ever retrieved....

A 5,300-year-old man found sticking out of an Alpine glacier in 1991 possessed more genes in common with Neandertals than Europeans today do. The man’s Neandertal heritage is a preliminary sign that Stone Age interbreeding occurred more frequently than many scientists assume. Two researchers determined that the previously analyzed genome of Ötzi the Tyrolean Iceman (SN: 3/24/12, p. 5) included roughly 4 to 4.5 percent Neandertal genes. Modern Europeans’ genetic library includes an average of 2.5 percent Neandertal genes. Human groups that migrated into Europe after 5,000 years ago mated with continental natives and diluted traces of Neandertal genetic ancestry...

No next-of-kin was around to claim the frozen 5,300-year-old body of Ötzi the Iceman when it was found in the Italian Alps in 1991, but researchers now report that there are at least 19 genetic relatives of Ötzi living in Austria's Tyrol region. "These men and the 'Iceman' had the same ancestors," Walther Parson, a researcher at the Institute for Forensic Medicine in Innsbruck, told the Austrian Press Agency last week. The relatives may not know they're related, however. The Austrian researchers haven't told them. They found the 19 genetic matches by looking through the DNA records of 3,700 Austrian...

Ötzi’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 analyzed 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. Ötzi'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...

This is what may have happened around 3,200 BC on the Lake of Mondsee (Lake Constance), resulting in the exodus of a metalworking community that lived there. When the site of this particular settlement was excavated in the 19th century, 595 stone axes and studded battleaxes, 451 arrowheads along with 12 copper axes and six daggers were discovered. These items represented highly sought-after status symbols, and would never have been left behind intentionally, unless of course the settlement had been abandoned as the result of a disaster. Well preserved foods such as charred hazelnuts, grain and pieces of apples were...

Abstract -- In the last years several phylogeographic studies of both extant and extinct red deer populations have been conducted. Three distinct mitochondrial lineages (western, eastern and North-African/Sardinian) have been identified reflecting different glacial refugia and postglacial recolonisation processes. However, little is known about the genetics of the Alpine populations and no mitochondrial DNA sequences from Alpine archaeological specimens are available. Here we provide the first mitochondrial sequences of an Alpine Copper Age Cervus elaphus. DNA was extracted from hair shafts which were part of the remains of the clothes of the glacier mummy known as the Tyrolean Iceman or...

SAN FRANCISCO — Ötzi the Iceman, an astonishingly well-preserved Neolithic mummy found in the Italian Alps in 1991, was a native of Central Europe, not a first-generation émigré from Sardinia, new research shows. And genetically, he looked a lot like other Stone Age farmers throughout Europe. he new findings, reported Thursday (Nov. 8) here at the American Society of Human Genetics conference, support the theory that farmers, and not just the technology of farming, spread during prehistoric times from the Middle East all the way to Finland. "The idea is that the spread of farming and agriculture, right now we...

Alpine guardians try to put treasures on ice Richard OwenApril 17, 2008 Prehistoric treasures unearthed in the Alps as melting glaciers recede are under threat from looters who are removing many of them. Such is the concern for the newly revealed objects - which include weapons, clothing and tools - that a task force of archaeologists, anthropologists, mountain climbers and Alpine rescue teams has been formed in an attempt to salvage them. Franco Nicolis, an archaeologist from Trento, said: “We must be ready to intervene as if we were dealing with a public calamity.” He said that mountain climbers and...

Hours before he died, "Ötzi" the Iceman gorged on the fatty meat of a wild goat, according to a new analysis of the famous mummy's stomach contents. The frozen body of the Copper Age hunter was discovered in 1991 in the Alps of northern Italy, where he died some 5,000 years ago. The circumstances surrounding Ötzi's death are not fully known, but the most popular theory—based in part on the discovery of an arrowhead in his back—is that he was murdered by other hunters while fleeing through the mountains. Scientists previously analyzed the contents of Ötzi's lower intestine and determined...

In a presentation at the Seventh World Congress on Mummy Studies, researchers from the Institute for Mummies and the Iceman revealed that they had finally located the iceman known as Otzi’s stomach and determined his last meal. They were also able to successfully sequence his entire genome. Researchers from the Institute for Mummies and the Iceman in Italy divided the presentation into three different topics. The first part of the presentation was given by microbiologist Frank Maixner. He had recently examined old tomography scans taken of Otzi back in 2005 and was able to finally locate the stomach which was...

It has been nearly a decade since Manadel al-Jamadi, an Iraqi prisoner known as "the Iceman" — for the bungled attempt to cool his body and make him look less dead — perished in CIA custody at Abu Ghraib. But now there are rumbles in Washington that the notorious case, as well as other alleged CIA abuses, could be returning to haunt the agency. TIME has learned that a prosecutor tasked with probing the CIA — John Durham, a respected, Republican-appointed U.S. Attorney from Connecticut — has begun calling witnesses before a secret federal grand jury in Alexandria, Va., looking...