A large amount of time among the scientists believed that the ancient mummies contain an insufficient amount of genetic material to conduct DNA examination.
German scientists from the max Planck Institute and the University of tübingen managed to partially reconstruct the genome of 90 Egyptian mummies, age from 3500 to 1500 years. All the mummies were embalmed in one of the villages of Ancient Egypt.
The procedure of mummification preserved the facial features of the dead, but at the same time destroyed the genetic material. Despite this, professionals are attracted by the collection of Tubingen University, and Felix von Luchana, consisting of 151 the mummy.
Scientists were able to extract from mummies 90 suitable for further study of mitochondrial and nuclear DNA taken from bones, teeth and soft tissues by high-throughput sequencing.
This analysis has allowed to know that the ancient Egyptians were not indigenous Africans. And their DNA is more similar to DNA of present-day inhabitants of southern Europe, the Caucasus and the Middle East.
Experts have compared the ancient genome with the DNA of modern Europeans and found that on average around half of European men are relatives of Tutankhamun. And in the UK, France and Spain and they did 60-70 percent.
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