Medical Discovery News
Science permeates everyday life. Yet the understanding of advances in biomedical science is limited at best. Few people make the connection that biomedical science is medicine and that biomedical scientists are working today for the medicine of tomorrow. Our weekly five-hundred-word newspaper column (http://www.illuminascicom.com/) and two-minute radio show provide insights into a broad range of biomedical science topics. Medical Discovery News is dedicated to explaining discoveries in biomedical research and their promise for the future of medicine. Each release is designed to stimulate listeners to think, question and appreciate how science affects their health as well as that of the rest of the world. We also delve into significant biomedical discoveries and portray how science (or the lack of it) has impacted health throughout history.
Medical Discovery News
Out of the Bog
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923 Out of the Bog
Welcome to Medical Discovery News. I’m Dr David Niesel.
And I’m Dr. Norbert Herzog.
While cutting peat in a bog in Denmark, workers in nineteen fifteen discovered the skeletal remains of a man along with a wooden club, a ceramic vessel, and bovine bones.
Among the bones was a fragmented skull. The man died about fifty-two hundred years ago. Researchers named him Vittrup Man and believe he was killed by blows to the head. New studies now paint a clearer picture of him.
Bone analysis shows he was an adult and his teeth put him between thirty and forty years old. Since there was no trace of healing to his skull, the trauma was fatal. And the club found with him may have been the weapon.
We don’t know whether the motive was robbery or a sacrifice since that was common practice in the region at the time.
Chemical and protein analysis of his teeth and bones revealed that he went from a hunter-gatherer diet of fish, seals, and whales to that of a farmer.
Genetically, he may have been related to the Mesolithic people from the Scandinavian Peninsula such as Northern Norway or Sweden. He probably had blue eyes, dark hair, and was short.
Judging from his diet, he made his way south crossing nearly fifty miles of open sea at age eighteen or nineteen to Denmark. He may have been a slave or captive or perhaps a trader who decided to settle there.
What’s clear now is that he is the earliest known Danish migrant settler who continues to show us migration is a fundamental part of the human experience.
We are Drs. David Niesel and Norbert Herzog, at UTMB and Quinnipiac University, where biomedical discoveries shape the future of medicine. For much more and our disclaimer go to medicaldiscoverynews.com or subscribe to our podcast. Sign up for expanded print episodes at www.illuminascicom.com
