Face of ‘gilded lady’ mummy digitally reconstructed by scientists 1,500 years after her death

They are raising the dead digitally.

Scientists put the “animation” in “resurrection” after virtually reconstructing the face of a mysterious mummy that lived 1,500 years ago, as detailed in the journal Anthropologie – International Journal of Human Diversity and Evolution.

Known as the Gilded Lady because of her golden covering, the mummy belonged to a woman who lived in Roman-occupied Egypt and died in her 40s, possibly from tuberculosis, the authors speculated.

“It’s a delicate, youthful-looking face,” study lead author and Brazilian graphic designer Cicero Moraes told Pen News of the recreation, which he conducted in collaboration with an international team of scientists.

The visage of the figure is smooth with short and curly hair, not unlike a modern social media profile. She also had a slight underbite and lumps of resin that were likely inserted during mummification to improve the smell.

To preserve the remains, the authors never opened the carcass, which is currently in Chicago’s Field Museum, according to a release from the American Museum of Natural History.

However, they did a CT scan of her corpse for the first time in 2011, which allowed them to map her body as a form of corpus cartography.

The team then used the same technique to reveal a face – a process that was facilitated by the mummy’s exceptional state of preservation.

“Initially, we reconstructed the skull, based on computer tomography [a method that uses X-ray technology to produce images of the body’s inside], and later adjusted the position of the jaw,” Moraes recalls. “The skull allows us to design structures such as the nose, the ears, the position of the eyes, the borders of the lips and others, using the data measured in the tomography of living people.”

In addition, the coroner said, “we use ultrasound measurements, also in living people, to detect the thickness of soft tissues in different regions of the skull.”

Because of the Gilded Lady’s origins in Roman-occupied Egypt, the team approximated her skin circumference using relevant data from modern European women aged 40 to 49.

They then adjusted the face and skull of a “virtual donor” to match the parameters of the gilded lady, making sure it was structurally compatible.

Scientists completed this recreation of the face by cross-referencing all the data and projecting it onto her virtual appearance.

Since her skin color is ambiguous, scientists created a color version and a grayscale version to avoid guessing about skin tone.

Interestingly, they didn’t have to go to great lengths to recreate other seemingly broken features during this digital autopsy. The woman’s curly hair was remarkably intact, again due to the preservation methods.

“She reminds me of my mother-in-law in some ways!” joked Moraes. “During the process, I showed it to several family members and they all agreed.”

While scientists have yet to name the digital face, her burial method suggests she was “a middle-class individual,” according to Cicero’s co-author Michael Habicht of Flinders University in Australia.

More importantly, the case illustrates how scientists can use CT scans to glean insights into a mummy’s appearance, age and other vital information without desecrating the deceased.

“Scans like these are noninvasive, they’re repeatable, and they can be done without damaging the history we’re trying to understand,” said David Hurst Thomas, curator of anthropology at the American Museum of Natural History, who was not involved. in study.