5,500-year-old human remains from Colombia indicate the spread of syphilis from America

In Colombia, scientists have found 5,500-year-old human remains with the oldest known trace of the bacterium Treponema pallidum, which causes syphilis and other diseases. This was reported by Live Science, according to UNN.

Details

The research was conducted in a rock shelter in Colombia, where the skeleton of a middle-aged hunter-gatherer was discovered. Scientists established that the person was infected with a previously unknown strain of Treponema pallidum. However, no characteristic lesions typically associated with late stages of treponemal infections were found on the bones.

Scientists note that previously, the oldest evidence of T. pallidum dated back to approximately 1000 AD in Chile and between 350 BC and 570 AD in Brazil.

"Our findings push back the association of T. pallidum with humans by thousands of years," said study author Davide Bozzi.

The discovered genome was named TE1-3. According to the study, it is a separate lineage, distinct from all currently known subspecies of T. pallidum. Statistical analysis showed that this strain diverged from modern lineages approximately 13,700 years ago. At the same time, researchers emphasize that the TE1-3 genome does not answer the question of whether early strains could have been sexually transmitted, like modern syphilis.

Modern genomic data, along with the genome presented here, do not resolve long-standing disputes about the origin of the disease syndromes themselves, but they do show that there is a long evolutionary history of pathogenic treponemes that began to diversify in the Americas thousands of years earlier than previously thought.

Recall

An international study found that Earth's geological timescale follows a clear mathematical pattern. The boundaries of epochs, periods, and eras are formed by a deeply rooted rhythm spanning hundreds of millions of years.