Cancer: an old disease, a new disease or something in between?

In industrialized societies, cancer is second only to cardiovascular disease as a cause of death. The history of this disorder has the potential to improve our understanding of disease prevention, aetiology, pathogenesis and treatment. A striking rarity of malignancies in ancient physical remains might indicate that cancer was rare in antiquity, and so poses questions about the role of carcinogenic environmental factors in modern societies. Although the rarity of cancer in antiquity remains undisputed, the first published histological diagnosis of cancer in an Egyptian mummy demonstrates that new evidence is still forthcoming.

Raman spectroscopy of natron: shedding light on ancient Egyptian mummification.

The mummification ritual in ancient Egypt involved the evisceration of the corpse and its desiccation using natron, a naturally occurring evaporitic mineral deposit from the Wadi Natrun, Egypt. The deposit typically contains sodium carbonate, sodium bicarbonate and impurities of chloride and sulfate as its major elemental components. It is believed that the function of the natron was to rapidly remove the water from the cadaver to prevent microbial attack associated with subsequent biological tissue degradation and putrefaction. Several specimens of natron that were recently collected from the Wadi Natrun contained coloured zones interspersed with the mineral matrix that are superficially reminiscent of extremophilic cyanobacterial colonisation found elsewhere in hot and cold deserts. Raman spectroscopy of these specimens using visible and near-infrared laser excitation has revealed not only the mineral composition of the natron, but also evidence for the presence of cyanobacterial colonies in several coloured zones observed in the mineral matrix. Key Raman biosignatures of carotenoids, scytonemin and chlorophyll have been identified.

Combined FT-Raman spectroscopic and mass spectrometric study of ancient Egyptian sarcophagal fragments.

The application of combined Raman spectroscopic and GC-MS analytical techniques for the characterisation of organic varnish residues from Egyptian Dynastic funerary sarcophagal and cartonnage fragments from the Graeco-Roman period, ca. 2200 BP, is described. The nondestructive use of Raman spectroscopy was initially employed to derive information about the specific location of organic material on the specimens, which were then targeted in specific areas using minimal sampling for GC-MS analysis. In the case of the sarcophagal fragment, a degraded yellow-brown surface treatment was identified as a Pistacia spp. resin; this provides additional evidence for the use of this resin, which has previously been identified in Canaanite transport amphorae, varnishes and "incense" bowls in an Egyptian Late Bronze Age archaeological context. The cartonnage fragment also contained an organic coating for which the Raman spectrum indicated a degradation that was too severe to facilitate identification, but the GC-MS data revealed that it was composed of a complex mixture of fatty acid residues. The combined use of GC-MS and Raman spectroscopy for the characterisation of organic materials in an archaeological context is advocated for minimisation of sampling and restriction to specifically identified targets for museum archival specimens.