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Cousin of the bacterium at the origin of the Black Death, a deadly microbe would have contributed to the decline of the populations of the time
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A group of European scientists has discovered evidence of what might be considered the first pandemic of the human species. Guilherme Eler
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7 dec. 2018, 19:46
(Science Picture Co / Getty Images) According to a scientific article published in Cell on Thursday (6), the plague was still prevalent in Neolithic, there are near 5,000 years, and changed the dynamics of the population throughout
The bacterium responsible has a name and a surname: Yersinia pestis . If you are good at history, you may remember that the microbe in question is at the origin of the Black Death (or bubonic plague), a disease that killed a third of the European population in the 14th century.
The existence of the bacterium was revealed by the badysis of the DNA of a tooth that belonged to a Scandinavian woman, died at 20 years. . She was buried among 77 other people in a village in western Sweden. Comparing the variety found with genomes of other bacteria of the genus Yersinia existing, such as ] Y. pseudotuberculosis scientists found that it was necessary deal with the evolutionary version older than the one known until now . Contrary to the most famous version of the European pest, the contagion did not occur by the urine of rats, but rather by drops of saliva.
In searching for the most primitive origins of the species, the researchers went to Cucuteni culture, a human group from the Neolithic period that occupied the region we know today. under the name of Romania. , Moldova and Ukraine. It is thought that Y.
At the time, the Cucuteni had overpopulated farming communities, where they lived between 10,000 and 20,000 people. From these villages, bacteria have spread commercially (made possible by technologies such as the wheel and animal traction) across the continent of Europe, from cold Siberia to Scandinavia. . And there are signs that the microbe has gone even further. The modern descendant of modern bacteria, for example, appeared in East Asia 5,100 years ago.
"Thus, for the first time in the history of mankind, there were simultaneously ideal conditions for the emergence of diseases, the large colonies, while there was enough technology for them. spread rapidly over great distances, "said Nicolas Rascovan, who led the study, to the BBC (19659007).
According to the researchers, this relationship is directly related to the decline of European populations observed during this period and began at least 8000 years ago
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