Scientists resurrect ancient Iceman's yeast to bake sourdough

More than five thousand years before the Egyptian pyramids rose, a man walked through the high Alps on the border of what is now Austria and Italy. He was killed by an arrow in the back. His name, as archaeologists know him, is Ötzi the Iceman. This week, scientists announced they had extracted living yeast from his preserved remains and fermented it into bread, according to Phys.org.

The discovery comes from research into the microbiome of the mummified body, which has been held in Bolzano's South Tyrol Museum of Archaeology since its discovery in 1991. The yeast, dormant for millennia in Ötzi's digestive tract, proved viable enough to culture and use in a working sourdough starter. The finding offers an unexpected window into the microbial ecology of the Alpine region in the Copper Age, before the Bronze Age transformed European metallurgy and trade.