Ötzi the Iceman has been frozen for 5,300 years, and something on him is still capable of growing.
Researchers at Eurac Research in Bolzano, Italy, took Europe's oldest natural mummy out of its chamber in April 2019 and held it at 4 degrees Celsius for five hours until the ice shell covering the body melted. They collected that meltwater and surface ice, swabbed 12 anatomical sites, took soft tissue, and cultured what came off. Four species of cold-loving yeast grew in the dish. Their findings appeared in the journal Microbiome on June 3.
