Scientists resurrect ancient Iceman's yeast to bake sourdough

More than five thousand years before the Egyptian pyramids rose, a man walked through the high Alps on the border of what is now Austria and Italy. He was killed by an arrow in the back. His name, as archaeologists know him, is Ötzi the Iceman. This week, scientists announced they had extracted living yeast from his preserved remains and fermented it into bread, according to Phys.org.

The discovery comes from research into the microbiome of the mummified body, which has been held in Bolzano's South Tyrol Museum of Archaeology since its discovery in 1991. The yeast, dormant for millennia in Ötzi's digestive tract, proved viable enough to culture and use in a working sourdough starter. The finding offers an unexpected window into the microbial ecology of the Alpine region in the Copper Age, before the Bronze Age transformed European metallurgy and trade.

The research underscores the region's role as a site of scientific inquiry into human prehistory. Ötzi's body—discovered at 3,210 metres on the Similaun glacier, straddling the modern border between South Tyrol and Austria—has yielded detailed evidence of Copper Age diet, clothing, tools and disease. The yeast finding adds a living dimension to that archive: it suggests that fermentation, whether intentional or incidental, was part of Alpine life even then.

For the Trentino-Alto Adige region, the discovery reinforces the international significance of the Bolzano museum as a centre for Alpine archaeology and conservation. The yeast experiment demonstrates how the region's scientific institutions continue to extract new knowledge from its most famous prehistoric resident, drawing international attention to the cultural and natural heritage of the high Alps. The bread itself—a tangible product of ancient microbiology—becomes both evidence and symbol of continuity across five millennia of mountain life.