Search Here

Now the digestive system of Otzi, a well-preserved body of a 5,300-year-old European Iceman, seems to be interesting.

His body was discovered in 1991 in the Alps, which might tell us more about the pattern of migration of prehistoric man.

The European Academy of Bozen's Frank Maixner, one of the authors, said that Otzi gives a lot of data about the prehistoric Europeans.

"We have many skeletons from that period, but we can see his organs, his clothes... He provides a huge package of information," Maixner said, according to New Scientist.

His digestive tract was pretty exciting, as "His stomach was completely filled - he ate quite a lot before he was murdered," Maixner added.

They found the bacterium Helicobacter pylori, a common human virus. It represents a pure Asian origin.

"The extant European population of H. pylori is known to be a hybrid between Asian and African bacteria, but there exist different hypotheses about when and where the hybridization took place, reflecting the complex demographic history of Europeans," the team wrote.

"Here, we present a 5300-year-old H. pylori genome from a European Copper Age glacier mummy. The 'Iceman' H. pylori is a nearly pure representative of the bacterial population of Asian origin that existed in Europe before hybridization, suggesting that the African population arrived in Europe within the past few thousand years," the team added.

This bacterium is still existent in Europe, even though it is a hybrid of strains from Eurasia and Africa, reports The Telegraph.

Three years ago, scientists had another interesting discovery about Otzi the Iceman. He had been hit with an arrow and was clubbed to death.

The study was published in the Jan. 8,2016 issue of the journal Science.