The Virgin has tuberculosis before being sacrificed

Recent research on a 500-year-old mummy named " Maiden" revealed that the 15-year-old Inca suffered a bacterial lung infection at the time of death.

>>>Display mummy 500 year old virgin

The Maiden along with another 7-year-old boy was discovered in 1999 in an ice hole at an altitude of 6,739 meters above the sea level of Argentina's Llullaillaco volcano. According to scientists, the two children were turned into sacrificial objects used in the Inca religious ritual, the area stretching along the present Andes.

Previous results have shown that the two babies were 'fattened' with a fairly complete diet of corn and llamas of dried llamas within a year. After death, the temperature is always at freezing level with some other natural factors that help preserve their bodies almost intact.

The 500-year-old mummy named 'Virgin' is told
larynx almost intact.(Photo: Angelique Corthals)

In the study, anthropologist Angelique Corthals from New York University and colleagues took samples of two mummies including blood on the boy's robe and analyzed the protein sequence in body cells. Using a technique called shotgun proteomics, they put the research sample into a device called mass spectrometer, bringing all the protein sequences of the sample into the constituents of amino acid chains.

Then, with complex computer software, the team could compare them with the existing proteins in the human genome to determine the actual protein in the study sample, Corthals explained.'You will not apply this method to animals without a complete genome , ' she said.

The results show that the protein information on Maiden matches the medical record of a patient with chronic respiratory infection. The Maiden's chest X-ray and DNA analysis also found signs of a bacterium belonging to the genus Mycobacterium, which is the causative agent of upper respiratory infections and tuberculosis. This was not found in the mummy 7-year-old boy.

In addition, the study also found that shotgun proteomics may play an important role in determining disease or cause of death in cases involving archeology, health and crime. Currently, Corthals is conducting many other tests to see if this technique can be used with older and lesser samples, such as small bones or Egyptian mummies.

Reference: Livescience