Worlds Oldest Cheese
-
For millennia, the Taklamakan Desert environment preserved more than the bodies of those buried in China’s Tarim Basin. Scattered around the necks of some laid to rest in Xiaohe, a Bronze Age cemetery, archaeologists found pebble-sized hunks of a yellowish substance: the world’s oldest cheese. A new analysis of the ancient dairy’s DNA hints at how it was made and how its production spread, researchers report today in Cell.
In a previous study, researchers took tiny samples of the 3,500-year-old cheese that bedecked the mummies’ necks. An analysis of proteins in those bits revealed the presence of Lactobacillus kefiranofaciens, a microbe used to produce a type of fermented cheese called kefir.
-
Kefir's awesome. Goes great on granola.
Hello! It looks like you're interested in this conversation, but you don't have an account yet.
Getting fed up of having to scroll through the same posts each visit? When you register for an account, you'll always come back to exactly where you were before, and choose to be notified of new replies (either via email, or push notification). You'll also be able to save bookmarks and upvote posts to show your appreciation to other community members.
With your input, this post could be even better 💗
Register Login