Curiosity Leads Researchers to Identify A New Mystifying Quality of the Brain
Unlike the rest of our soft tissue, brains can survive for at least 12,000 years
Scientists can learn a lot from studying the skeletal remains unearthed from archeological sites, including (but not limited to) the age of the person when they died, their sex, their health, their potential social status, and even some injuries they obtained when alive, even when those injuries occurred and how they healed.
But unless a body is intentionally preserved through mummification, for instance, then the skeleton is the only part of the body scientists usually have to learn from. Unlike bone, our soft tissue decomposes relatively quickly, and it was long thought the brain was one of the first organs to break down.
The idea that a brain could be naturally preserved for thousands of years was once laughable. However, following a curiosity, Oxford researchers have shown that brain preservation is more common than experts assumed.
The Curiosity
Alexandra Morton-Hayward, a postgraduate researcher at the University of Oxford and forensic anthropologist, told NPR’s Scott Simon in an interview that she worked as an undertaker and embalmer studying human remains to tell…
