DNA | DD News

October 27, 2025 7:54 PM

DNA from mass grave reveals pathogens that beset Napoleon’s army in 1812

The retreat from Russia by Napoleon Bonaparte and the French Grande Armée in 1812 was a cataclysmic event that marked the beginning of the end for his empire and personal dominance in Europe, with about 300,000 soldiers perishing in a force that originally numbered roughly a half million. A new study involving DNA extracted from the teeth of 13 French soldiers who were buried in a mass grave in Lithuania's capital Vilnius along the route of the retreat is offering a deeper understanding of the...

January 13, 2025 6:27 PM

Study shows tumour DNA in blood may help predict lung cancer outcomes

A team of British scientists has found that a blood test to detect circulating tumour DNA (ctDNA) may help predict lung cancer outcomes. Circulating tumour DNA, which consists of fragments of DNA released into the blood by tumours, is known to play an important role in disease prognosis but is challenging to measure accurately. In a study, researchers from the Francis Crick Institute and University College London used a whole-genome sequencing platform called NeXT Personal, which can detect ve...

September 16, 2024 5:58 PM

Genome evidence points to plague in Stone Age European population crash

Around 5,000 years ago, the population in northern Europe collapsed, decimating Stone Age farming communities across the region. The cause of this calamity, called the Neolithic decline, has remained a matter of debate. New research based on DNA obtained from human bones and teeth excavated from ancient burial tombs in Scandinavia - seven from an area in Sweden called Falbygden, one from coastal Sweden close to Gothenburg and one from Denmark - suggests disease, specifically the plague, may hav...

June 13, 2024 1:56 PM

Maya sacrifice of twin boys revealed by DNA from Chichen Itza

In 1967, an underground cistern known as a chultun was discovered near a sacred body of water at Chichen Itza, an important ancient Maya city on Mexico's Yucatan peninsula. Skeletal remains of more than 100 children were found inside. Now, DNA obtained from 64 of them is offering insight into child sacrifice at Chichen Itza in the centuries before Europeans reached the New World. Those entombed were all boys - some of them brothers, including two sets of identical twins - killed during reli...