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A 550-year-old microbiology lesson emerges from BC glacier
University of Saskatchewan microbiologist Harry Deneer thought he'd seen it all, but then he saw tissue samples from a 550-year-old corpse. Deneer is one of a handful of researchers chosen to study the remains of an Aboriginal man found frozen near a glacier in northern British Columbia. He will examine the normal and pathogenic bacteria in the body to learn what diseases were common 5 centuries ago and how the pathogens that cause them have evolved since then. "It gives you a clue to the evolution of pathogens," he says. "If you know how something came into being, you may be able to predict how it will change in the future."
The frozen man has been named Kwaday Dan Sinchi (Long Ago Person Found) by the Champagne and Aishihik First Nations. Carbon dating of his belongings place them around 1450, making him the oldest preserved human found in North America and predating known European contact on the northwest coast of Canada by 300 years.
The BC government, in agreement with the Champagne and Aishihik First Nations, has approved 10 research projects, ranging from an analysis of the man's last meal to a cultural study of his hunting tools. A DNA profile will be completed and compared with that of today's indigenous people.
Deneer's project team, which includes an anthropologist, is the only one to study microbes found in the body. It will look at tissue samples from the intestinal tract, lungs, liver and spleen. The results could take a year to compile, after which unused tissue will be returned to BC, where Kwaday Dan Sinchi will be buried according to Aboriginal custom. — Amy Jo Ehman, Saskatoon
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