Scientists Try to Save Ancient Mummies from Changing into Black Ooze

When you think of mummies, you usually think of ancient Egypt. But at least 2,000 years before ancient Egyptians began mummifying their pharaohs, a hunter-gatherer people called the Chinchorro in modern-day Chile and Peru were mummifying their dead. These mummies, though, are in danger of rapidly degrading; now, scientists are trying to find out a way to stop the deterioration.

Nearly 120 Chinchorro mummies are housed in a museum in Arica, Chile. Recently, though, scientists have noticed the mummies were starting to visibly degrade at an alarming rate. In fact, some specimens were actually turning into black ooze. Unfortunately, over the past 10 years the degradation has accelerated.

"We knew the mummies were degrading but nobody understood why," said Ralph Mitchell, one of the researchers, in a news release. "This kind of degradation has never been studied before. We wanted to answer two questions: what was causing it and what could we do to prevent further degradation?"

The researchers took physical samples from the mummies-both degrading skin and undamaged skin. They quickly found that the degradation was microbial, and then set about determining if there was a microbiome on the mummy skin that was responsible.

"The key word that we use a lot in microbiology is opportunism," said Mitchell. "With many diseases we encounter, the microbe is in our body to begin with, but when the environment changes it becomes an opportunist."

The researchers isolated microbes present in samples and then cultured organisms in the lab. They then tested the samples to see what happened when they were exposed to different humidity levels.

Humidity levels in the area where the museum was located have been on the rise, and the scientists found that these levels may be to blame for the mummy degradation. These findings, in particular, could help the museum fine-tune temperature, humidity and light levels to preserve the mummies.

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