The faces of three men who lived in ancient Egypt over 2,000 years ago have been revived. Digital reconstruction depicts a 25-year-old man based on DNA data extracted from a mummified corpse.
The mummy came from the ancient Egyptian city of Absir Hermerek in the floodplain of southern Cairo and was buried between 1380 BC and 425 AD. Scientists at the Maxplank Institute for Human History Science in Tubingen, Germany.Mummy sequence DNA 2017; It was the first successful reconstruction of the ancient Egyptian mummy genome, Live science reported At the time.
And now, researchers at Parabon Nano Labs, a DNA technology company in Reston, Virginia, are using that genetic data to predict the shape of facial features using genetic analysis through a process called forensic DNA phenotyping. Created a 3D model of the mummy’s face and other aspects of a person’s appearance.
Related: Image gallery: Egyptian mummy’s face revealed
“This is the first comprehensive DNA phenotyping of human DNA of this age,” said a Parabon representative. Said in a statement.. Parabon revealed the mummy’s face at the 32nd International Symposium on Human Identification on September 15th in Orlando, Florida.
Scientists used a phenotypic method called snapshots to predict male ancestors, skin color, and facial features. They found that men had light brown skin and dark eyes and hair.Overall, their genetically According to the statement, makeup was closer to that of modern people in the Mediterranean and Middle East than to modern Egyptians.
The researchers then generated a 3D mesh that outlines the features of the mummy’s face, calculated a heatmap to highlight the differences between the three individuals, and refined the details of each face. Parabon forensic artists then combined these results with snapshot predictions of skin, eye, and hair color.
Working with ancient human DNA can be difficult for two reasons. DNA is often highly degraded and usually Bacteria DNA said Ellen Greatuck, director of bioinformatics at Parabon.
“Between these two factors, the amount of human DNA available for sequencing can be very low,” Greytak told Live Science in an email. However, because most of the DNA is shared among all humans, scientists do not need the entire genome to collect physical images of humans. Rather, you only need to analyze specific spots in the genome that vary from person to person, known as single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs). Many of these SNPs code for physical differences between individuals, Greatac said.
However, ancient DNA may not provide enough SNPs to identify certain properties. In such cases, scientists can replace non-existent genetic data with substitutions from other nearby SNPs, says Janet Caddy, a parabon bioinformatics scientist. Statistics calculated from thousands of genomes reveal how closely each SNP is associated with absent neighbors, Cady told Live Science in an email. From there, researchers can statistically predict what the missing SNPs are.
The process used in these ancient mummies could also help scientists recreate their faces and identify modern relics, Greatac told Live Science. Of the approximately 175 cold cases that helped Parabon researchers solve using genetic genealogy, 9 have been analyzed using the method of this study, according to Greytuck. ..
Originally published in Live Science.
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