When imagining what archaeologists find during excavations of ancient human remains, we might think only of bones — dry, silent, and skeletal clues to our past. But under ideal conditions, internal organs can survive thousands of years as well, preserving biological data that bones alone can’t reveal.
Now, researchers at the University of Oxford’s Nuffield Department of Medicine have developed a groundbreaking method to extract and analyze proteins from ancient soft tissues. This new approach, published in PLOS ONE, could dramatically expand what we know about diet, disease, and daily life in the ancient world.
Proteins Offer Insight to Ancient Remains
While DNA often gets the spotlight in ancient remains research, proteins are just as vital, and in some ways, even more enduring. They can survive for millions of years due to their stable structure, which is less prone to degradation than the DNA that encodes them. More importantly, while only around 10 percent of human proteins are found in bone, a whopping 75 percent are expressed in internal organs like the brain, heart, and liver.
That means soft tissues hold a far more detailed biological archive — if we can access it. Proteins offer insights into evolutionary history, environmental exposures, and diseases that don’t leave marks on the skeleton. But until recently, soft tissue proteins were inaccessible due to the lack of reliable extraction methods.
Read More: More Than 300 Skeletons Uncovered From Medieval and Post-Medieval Eras in UK
Ancient Human Soft Tissues
Oxford researchers have now developed the first robust technique to retrieve and identify proteins from ancient human soft tissues, demonstrating their method on preserved brain samples excavated from a 19th-century British cemetery.
The team tested ten different approaches on 200-year-old human brain tissue recovered from Bristol’s former Blackberry Hill Hospital, once a Victorian workhouse and originally a prison for 18th-century war captives. One in ten of the 4,500 individuals buried at the site had preserved brain tissue.
The winning solution? Urea — yes, the main compound in urine. It effectively broke open the cells to release their protein contents. Once extracted, the proteins were separated using liquid chromatography and identified via mass spectrometry. To boost results even further, researchers added a step called FAIMS (high-field asymmetric-waveform ion mobility spectrometry), which improved protein detection by up to 40 percent.
“It all comes down to separation,” explained lead researcher Thomas Morton-Hayward in a press release. “It’s a bit like dumping out a bucket of Lego: if you can start to discriminate between pieces by color, then shape, then size, etc., the better chance you have of making something meaningful with it all.”
With just 2.5 milligrams of brain tissue, the team identified over 1,200 distinct proteins, representing the largest and most diverse set ever recovered from archaeological soft tissue.
New Window Into Human History
Be it muscles, stomachs, or brains, preserved soft tissues can tell us more than bones ever could. This includes insights into neurological health. The team detected proteins tied to healthy brain function as well as potential biomarkers of disorders like Alzheimer’s and multiple sclerosis.
“The vast majority of human diseases – including psychiatric illness and mental health disorders – leave no marks on the bone, so they’re essentially invisible in the archaeological record,” said Morton-Hayward. “This new technique opens a window on human history we haven’t looked through before.”
Senior author Roman Fischer added: “By enabling the retrieval of protein biomarkers from ancient soft tissues, this workflow allows us to investigate pathology beyond the skeleton, transforming our ability to understand the health of past populations.”
The method’s potential extends far beyond this study — from bog bodies to mummies and even ancient hormones — offering researchers an unprecedented toolkit for decoding the biological lives of our ancestors.
Read More: Medieval Skeleton Reveals What Life Was Like With a Disability in the Middle Ages
Article Sources
Our writers at Discovermagazine.com use peer-reviewed studies and high-quality sources for our articles, and our editors review for scientific accuracy and editorial standards. Review the sources used below for this article:
Having worked as a biomedical research assistant in labs across three countries, Jenny excels at translating complex scientific concepts – ranging from medical breakthroughs and pharmacological discoveries to the latest in nutrition – into engaging, accessible content. Her interests extend to topics such as human evolution, psychology, and quirky animal stories. When she’s not immersed in a popular science book, you’ll find her catching waves or cruising around Vancouver Island on her longboard.
