Otzi Blood Cells, Oldest Ever Found, Give Clues About Iceman's Death

A 5,300-year-old blood cell found in the tissue of Ötzi the Iceman.

By: Stephanie Pappas, LiveScience Senior Writer
Published: 05/01/2012 07:08 PM EDT on LiveScience

The oldest red blood cells ever identified have been found in the body of Ötzi the Iceman, a 5,300-year-old mummy found in the Alps in 1991.

The bloody find is a first for Ötzi's mummy, which has been under scientific scrutiny since a pair of hikers stumbled over the body frozen in ice on the Austrian-Italian border. And the new research, published today (May 1) in the Journal of the Royal Society Interface, helps confirm the story of Ötzi's death.

The Iceman was so well preserved that scientists could estimate his age (about 45), his health, his last meals (they included red deer meat with herb bread) and even his probable cause of death, an arrow wound to the shoulder that sliced an artery. But no one had ever found blood cells in the ancient man's corpse.

Albert Zink, a biological anthropologist at the European Academy of Bozen/Bolzano, was the leader of the study that uncovered the elusive cells. "It was very surprising, because we didn't really expect to find compete red blood cells," Zink said. "We hoped to find maybe some remnants or shrunken red blood cells, but these are looking like a modern-day sample; the dimensions are the same." [Photos: See the face of Ötzi]

Feeling for blood

Zink and his colleagues took tissue samples from Ötzi's arrow wound and from an earlier wound on the mummy's hand. Using a light microscope, they identified round objects that looked a bit like red blood cells, Zink said. But to be sure, the researchers needed more advanced technology.

They turned to a device called an atomic force microscope, which works by "feeling" rather than "seeing" an object. The minuscule probe, itself invisible to the naked eye, runs over the object like a needle on a record player. As the probe bumps up and down along the object's contours, a laser measures the movement. The result is a three-dimensional "tracing" of the object.

Story continues below.
MORE OTZI PHOTOS:

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• The mummy of an iceman named Otzi, discovered on 1991 in the Italian Schnal Valley glacier, is on display at the Archeological Museum of Bolzano on February 28, 2011 during an official presentation of the reconstrution. Visitors will get to see Iceman Oetzi under a new light starting on March 1 at the South Tyrol Museum of Archaeology in Bolzano, which celebrates the 20th anniversary of the mummy's discovery. Based on three-dimensional images of the mummy's skeleton as well as the latest forensic technology, a new model of the living Oetzi has been created by Dutch experts Alfons and Adrie Kennis. AFP PHOTO / Andrea Solero (Photo credit should read Andrea Solero/AFP/Getty Images)

• The mummy of an iceman named Otzi, discovered on 1991 in the Italian Schnal Valley glacier, is displayed at the Archeological Museum of Bolzano on February 28, 2011 during an official presentation of the reconstrution. Visitors will get to see Iceman Oetzi under a new light starting on March 1 at the South Tyrol Museum of Archaeology in Bolzano, which celebrates the 20th anniversary of the mummy's discovery. Based on three-dimensional images of the mummy's skeleton as well as the latest forensic technology, a new model of the living Oetzi has been created by Dutch experts Alfons and Adrie Kennis. AFP PHOTO / Andrea Solero (Photo credit should read Andrea Solero/AFP/Getty Images)

• A statue representing a mummy of an iceman named Oetzi, discovered on 1991 in the Italian Schnal Valley glacier, is displayed at the Archeological Museu of Bolzano on February 28, 2011 during an official presentation of the reconstrution. Based on three-dimensional images of the mummy's skeleton as well as the latest forensic technology, a new model of the living Oetzi has been created by Dutch experts Alfons and Adrie Kennis. AFP PHOTO / Andrea Solero (Photo credit should read Andrea Solero/AFP/Getty Images)

• A statue representing an iceman named Oetzi, discovered on 1991 in the Italian Schnal Valley glacier, is displayed at the Archeological Museu of Bolzano on February 28, 2011 during an official presentation of the reconstrution. Based on three-dimensional images of the mummy's skeleton as well as the latest forensic technology, a new model of the living Oetzi has been created by Dutch experts Alfons and Adrie Kennis. AFP PHOTO / Andrea Solero (Photo credit should read Andrea Solero/AFP/Getty Images)

• A statue representing an iceman named Oetzi, discovered on 1991 in the Italian Schnal Valley glacier, is displayed at the Archeological Museu of Bolzano on February 28, 2011 during an official presentation of the reconstrution. Based on three-dimensional images of the mummy's skeleton as well as the latest forensic technology, a new model of the living Oetzi has been created by Dutch experts Alfons and Adrie Kennis. AFP PHOTO / Andrea Solero (Photo credit should read Andrea Solero/AFP/Getty Images)

• Dutch artists Adrie Kennis (L) and Alfons Kennis, who made the reconstruction of a mummy of an iceman named Otzi, discovered on 1991 in the Italian Schnal Valley glacier, pose near the statue displayed at the Archeological Museum of Bolzano on February 28, 2011 during an official presentation. Based on three-dimensional images of the mummy's skeleton as well as the latest forensic technology, a new model of the living Oetzi has been created by Dutch experts Alfons and Adrie Kennis. AFP PHOTO / Andrea Solero (Photo credit should read Andrea Solero/AFP/Getty Images)

• South Tyrol Museum of Archaeology

• The Alpine landscape where Otzi was found. Image: South Tyrol Museum of Archaeology

• South Tyrol Museum of Archaeology

In the case of the mysterious Ötzi contents, an exciting picture emerged: The roundish shapes were indeed red blood cells.

"They have the typical form, this kind of doughnut-like shape of red blood cells," Zink told LiveScience. "The dimensions are the same in modern-day samples, so we were really quite sure these were red blood cells that had been preserved for 5,000 years." [Mummy Madness: Quiz Yourself]

A quick death

To confirm the finding, the researchers used a technique called Ramen spectroscopy, which uses light-scattering patterns to determine which molecules are present in a sample. The suspected blood cells had all the markers of true red blood cells, including hemoglobin, the protein that carries oxygen in the blood.

While other researchers have attempted to identify blood on older stone tools, this is the oldest definite confirmation of blood, Zink said. The find may help advance forensic science, because current crime-scene technology has trouble differentiating between old and new blood, he said.

But the finding also adds corroborating evidence to the long-cold murder case of Ötzi the Iceman. Traces of a protein called fibrin were found in the blood from the arrow wound, Zink said. Fibrin is a part of the clotting process that appears immediately after a wound but vanishes very quickly.

"The fact that we found some of the fibrin confirms that he didn't survive the arrow for a long period," Zink said. "It's good to have, because there were still some people [thinking] that maybe he could have survived the arrow shot for a few hours, a few days."

You can follow LiveScience senior writer Stephanie Pappas on Twitter @sipappas.Follow LiveScience for the latest in science news and discoveries on Twitter @livescience and on Facebook.

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Comments

[amandawills]

01:49 PM on 05/08/2012

I used to be an adventurer like you, but then I took an arrow to the shoulder...

[braigno2]

11:32 PM on 05/20/2012

Fus ro dah!!

[Andeesmustang]

01:42 AM on 05/07/2012

I do think it's something pretty interesting and helpful to learn more of, but on the other hand, let the poor man rest in peace.

[Mark Helfgott]

11:36 PM on 05/06/2012

He looks like he's been in a tanning bed too long. Is he the ancestor of that woman from Jersey?

[Autora]

10:48 PM on 05/06/2012

I'm just curious. I am not doubting the date of this mummy at all, but where did he get bread? What was the state of agriculture 5300 years ago in that area? Was it wheat bread?

[jjaycedar]

11:26 PM on 05/06/2012

The PigglyWiggly had it on sale that week for two cents. Man has had the knowledge of bread making, food storage, preparation, and beer making for far longer than 5300 years. If you are still in school listen, if you are out, go back.

[Autora]

11:38 PM on 05/06/2012

I asked very specific questions, none of which you answered. Did you somehow miss 'in that area' and 'was it wheat bread' or do you just like generalizing?

[giftoflife898]

11:41 PM on 05/06/2012

Unless he was a redneck and had cornbread.

[Autora]

12:45 AM on 05/07/2012

Another educated answer! At least it made me laugh. Wheat cannot be grown just anywhere, you know. Or maybe you don't?

[frankc354]

09:23 PM on 05/06/2012

this is Jimmy Hoffa

[illinoisgun]

09:19 PM on 05/06/2012

Maybe he died in Noah's flood? LOL!

[wwhatever747]

11:08 PM on 05/06/2012

Re: Maybe he shot the arrow up towards himself to prevent dying from drowning while fleeing up on the mountain during the Noah's flood?

[illinoisgun]

11:17 PM on 05/06/2012

LOL! Funny one.

[Seadiver777]

09:15 PM on 05/06/2012

The oldest confirmation of blood cells is from the femur of a T-rex dinosaur found by Mary Schweitzer. Though it was though to be 65 or so million years old, the fact that the blood cells and other soft tissues were intact but unfossilized indicates it could not have been nearly so long ago. Rather, it backs up the idea that the radiometric dating methods are unreliable, and instead that the creation was less than ten thousand years ago

[illinoisgun]

09:22 PM on 05/06/2012

False. Radiometric dating is very reliable. The notion that the earth was created 10,000 years ago has never been proven. In fact, it has been refuted by modern science well over 100 years ago.

[rrgb545]

04:21 PM on 05/07/2012

“Radiometric dating is very reliable.” Sorry to disagree but; geologists almost never subject radiometric dating measurements to blind tests. Science requires blind tests as standard procedure for overcoming experimenter bias.
When radiometric dates are compared with evolution based ages for fossils, either above or below radiometric dated rock, things fail to add –up. In one scientific study of published radiometric dates the indicators pointed to an error rate of at least one geologic age. This indicated major errors in methodology, and understanding.
As for your assertion that the age of the earth cannot be proven, one need only look to the Apollo moon mission. When evolutionists first calculated the age of the moon, their mathematical formula indicated that the moon was about 6.2 to 6.4 billion years old. If that was the case then by their formula the moon would have been a literal sea of dust on the surface. Calculations suggested a depth of 50 to 200 feet. Most disconcerting for a landing.
Further studies conducted by probes indicated serious flaws in the mathematical formula put together by evolutionists. A landing was probably safe. NASA decided to take a chance, and the rest is history. The astronauts that landed on the moon could not find dust anywhere that was more than about 2 inches thick. Recalculated formulas using 2 inch thick dust as a base line indicated the moon was no more than about 10,000 years old. So,

[Seadiver777]

07:33 AM on 05/11/2012

One way to tell the Earth cannot be that old is that the sedimentary rocks that cover the continents (and are thought to show many millions of years of slow gradual accumulation) are really evidence for a rapid, catastrophic, water burial (i.e. most likely Noah's flood) because there is no way to preserve the fossil animals in those layers by slow, gradual accumulation.

You know what happens when a deer dies in the woods: the coyotes will fight over it and scatter it around the woods overnight - if you go out in the woods you don't see a lot of animal bones laying around because they don't last very long. The same would happen with the body of a dinosaur.

[bigbe]

09:43 PM on 05/06/2012

You know, there are actually people out there stupid enough to take your word for this. In truth the scientists who discovered the soft tissue believe it to be about 70 million years old.
Never let information get in the way of stupidity.

[Seadiver777]

07:44 AM on 05/09/2012

Yes they do, but the key word here is 'believe'. And that in spite of the more obvious scientific evidence that soft tissue cannot remain anywhere near such time.

[psridgell]

07:17 PM on 05/06/2012

I fired an arrow into the air... and where it lands, I know not wherrrr....ughh !

[mscellanus]

06:55 PM on 05/06/2012

"so well preserved that scientists could estimate his age (about 45), his health, his last meals (they included red deer meat with herb bread"

Hopefully those red cells are not from the deer!!!

[philliplojek]

04:39 PM on 05/06/2012

5300 year old mummy? He doesn't look a day over 5000.

[Ken Blackwell]

05:29 PM on 05/06/2012

proper skin care

[wwhatever747]

11:08 PM on 05/06/2012

Re: By Whom? Avon?

[clintnapril2]

07:42 PM on 05/06/2012

And he exfoliated.

[srynmichael2]

04:07 PM on 05/06/2012

Old news.

[wwhatever747]

11:09 PM on 05/06/2012

Re: For the 56th time. This time on blood discovery, lame.

[srynmichael2]

06:57 AM on 05/07/2012

Still, old news.

[Howard Duley]

02:47 PM on 05/06/2012

And all this baloney proves what? 5300 years ago people stunk just like they do today.

[blueghost]

03:17 PM on 05/06/2012

speak for yourself.

[jbjg24m]

11:42 AM on 05/06/2012

he doesn't look a day over 4,999 yrs old to me

[interject]

10:38 AM on 05/06/2012

Come on...5,300 years? It kind of looks like my Uncle Earl who disappeared in 1953.

[rusknative]

10:21 AM on 05/06/2012

just another chicago political machine hit job....the assassin's future generation went on to put a President from Kenya into the white house. probably was a gay lover's quarrel in the first place.

[clintnapril2]

07:43 PM on 05/06/2012

Huh?