CT and DNA Analysis Helps in Finding Egypt's Lost Queen

Zahi Hawass announced and revealed on June 27, 2007, in an international press conference at Cairo's Egyptian Museum, a 3,500-year-old mummy now positively identified as Hatshepsut, one of history's few female pharaohs. Utilizing computed tomography (CT) scanning and ongoing DNA testing, Dr. Hawass solved the mystery of what happened to one of ancient Egypt's most powerful and effective rulers.

Dr. Hawass' archeologic and scientific quest has been documented in the cable TV channel, the Discovery Channel's Secrets of Egypt's Lost Queen, which premiered worldwide July 15, 2007. The investigative journey of Dr. Hawass and his team led them through the enormous crypts beneath Egypt and into the bowels of the Egyptian Museum. Utilizing knowledge of royal Egyptian mummification and clues from two known tombs linked to Hatshepsut, the team narrowed their search for Hatshepsut to only four mummies from thousands of unidentified corpses.

CT scanning allows the scientists to connect distinctive physical traits of the four mummies to those of Hatshepsut's known relatives. The search further narrows to two possibilities--both from the tomb of Hatshepsut's wet nurse--but the final clue lies within a canopic box inscribed with the female pharaoh's name. A scan of the box finds a tooth that, when measured, precisely matches a missing upper molar in one of the two mummies.

Applied Biosystems (Forest City, CA, USA), an international provider of DNA analysis technologies, and Discovery Quest, Discovery Channel's initiative to support the scientific community's work, enabled the construction of and equipment for the first-ever ancient DNA testing facility located in the Cairo Museum in Egypt. The DNA testing facility will not only be used to extract and compare nuclear and mitochondrial DNA of the Hatshepsut mummy and mummies from her family, but will be used by scientists to examine future discoveries in Egypt and attempt to further determine familial relationships among the royal families.

CT imaging technology from Siemens Medical Solutions (Erlangen, Germany) allowed scientists to conduct detailed CT scanning of each of the mummies. By using their technology in a project such as this, archeologists were able to go beneath the wrappings and fragile bodies of some of Egypt's greatest pharaohs without damaging them.

More powerful than Cleopatra or Nefertiti, Hatshepsut grabbed the throne from her young stepson, dressed herself as a man, and in an extraordinary move declared herself pharaoh. Though her power stretched across Egypt and her reign was prosperous, Hatshepsut's legacy was systematically erased from Egyptian history--historical records were destroyed, monuments destroyed, and her corpse removed from her tomb--and her death remains a mystery.


Related Links:
Applied Biosystems
Siemens Medical Solutions