Otherworldly?
X-ray
Courtesy show that Ata is not a hoax, but the DNA will disappoint UFO enthusiasts. Garry Nolan
Alien? Subhuman primate? deformed child? Mummified fetus? The Internet is buzzing about the nature of "Ata", a weird 6 inches long skeleton featured in a new documentary on UFOs. A scientist from Stanford University, who boldly into the fray now put to rest doubts about what species belongs Ata. But the mystery is not over.
The story began 10 years ago, when the tiny remains were reportedly found in a pocket in a ghost town in the Atacama Desert, Chile. Ata ended up in a private collection in Barcelona; Producers of the film Sirius locked on the strange mummy as evidence of extraterrestrial life.
Last fall, immunologist Garry Nolan, director of the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute Proteomics Center for Immunology systems at Stanford in California, Ata heard from a friend and contacted the filmmakers, offering to give them a scientific reading on the specimen. They asked him to give it a shot.
Among the apparent anomalies, Ata sports 10 ribs instead of the usual 12 and a severely deformed skull. "I asked our unit neonatal care how you analyze it would take. They had seen this kind of syndrome before? "Nolan said. He was taken to the pediatric radiologist Ralph Lachman, co-director of the International Registry Skeletal dysplasia at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles, California." He literally wrote the book on pediatric bone disorders, "says Nolan. Lachman was blown, Nolan recalls. "He said, 'Wow, this is like nothing I've ever seen before" "
To study the specimen, Nolan looked for evidence in the Ata genome. He first assumed the specimen was tens or hundreds of thousands of years old Atacama Desert may be the place driest in the world, while Ata could have been preserved for eons. He has consulted experts who extract DNA from bones denisovan, a European Asian parent Stone Age Neanderthals. There is evidence that their protocols are not required. "The DNA was modern, abundant, and high quality," he said, indicating that the specimen is probably a few decades.
To the dismay of UFO hunters, this is decidedly Ata world. having mapped over 500 million readings to a reference human genome, which is equivalent to 17.7 times coverage of the genome, Nolan concluded that Ata "is human, there is no doubt about it subject. "in addition, B2 haplotype-a sample class of mitochondrial-DNA reveals that his mother was from the west coast of South America. Chile, which is
Meanwhile, after examining X-rays, Lachman found that skeleton Aka development, based on the density of the epiphyseal plates knees (growth plates at the ends of long bones found only in children) appears surprisingly equivalent to a 6 to 8 years. If this holds up, there are two possibilities, says Nolan. One, a long shot, is that Ata had a severe form of dwarfism, was born as a little man, and lived up to that calendar age. To test this hypothesis, it will try to extract hemoglobin from the sample of bone marrow and compare the relative amounts of fetal hemoglobin proteins against adults. The second possibility is that Ata, the size of a fetus of 22 weeks of age, suffered from a severe form of a rare rapid aging disease, progeria, and died in the womb or after birth premature.
Nolan hasn 't yet turned up results for genes known to be associated with progeria or dwarfism. It is intensifying for mutations by sequencing and further casting a wider net. Another possibility is a teratogen: a toxic defect inducing birth along the lines of thalidomide. Nolan plans to analyze tissue using mass spectrometry in search of toxic substances or metabolites. But reports of a handful of other Tom Thumb size skeletons Russia and elsewhere Nolan leaning towards a genetic explanation.
At least one expert has taken, but more prosaic allow the human specimen. "This seems to me a human fetus badly dried and mummified or stillborn premature," says William Jungers, a paleoanthropologist and anatomist at the Medical Center Stony Brook University in New York. He notes that "barely ossified and immature elements" of hands and feet, and the suture metopic wide open, where the two frontal bones of the skull meets the forehead. "genetic abnormalities are not obvious, probably because there is not one," he said . Nolan said that the number of ribs and densities of epiphyseal plates remain a mystery; while it is open to the hypothesis of the fetus, he thinks the jury is still
the analysis is Nolan went viral this week. besieged as he was by the media circus, he does not regret getting involved in debunking a claim of alien life. "I am delighted with the result," he said. Once the testing is complete, he said, he will present his findings in peer review. The other application Nolan debunks is that Ata is a hoax. X-rays clearly show they are real bone, complete with arterial shadows, he said. "You could not just pretend," he says, adding with a laugh, "unless you were a stranger."
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