Lola found in ancient chewing gum

Genetics researchers sequence DNA from birch pitch.

This is an artistic reconstruction of “Lola” who, Danish researchers believe, lived around 5700 years ago. They obtained her entire genome, and learned a lot about her likely diet, from the DNA in a specimen of chewed birch pitch.

The team led by Hannes Schroeder from the University of Denmark determined the DNA was from a female and, based on genetic variation in several genes, that she likely had dark hair, dark skin and blue eyes. Writing in the journal Nature Communications, they suggest Lola was more closely related to western huntergatherers from continental Europe than hunter-gatherers from central Scandinavia.

Birch pitch is obtained by heating birch bark and has been used as an adhesive since the Middle Pleistocene (760,000 to 126,000 years ago).

Small lumps of it have been found at archaeological sites and have often included tooth imprints, suggesting they were chewed.

In the non-human ancient DNA found in their specimen, Schroeder and colleagues detected bacterial species characteristic of the oral microbiome, some of which are known pathogens such as Porphyromonas gingivalis, which are implicated in gum disease.