@article{24200,
  keywords = {leprosy, History of leprosy, DNA},
  author = {Gibbons A},
  title = {On the trail of ancient killers},
  abstract = {The newly unveiled genome of a medieval strain of the mycobacterium that causes leprosy is a technical triumph borne of next-generation sequencing machines and clever new techniques to extract target DNA from a soup of ancient molecules. Awash in data, several labs are racing neck-and-neck to cull DNA from a Most Wanted list of other legendary killers: tuberculosis, plague, cholera, Leishmania, the potato blight, and AIDS. They gather traces of these culprits from ancient teeth, bones, hair, feces, and{\textemdash}in the case of potato blight{\textemdash}from skin and leaves, then unleash the sequencers. The work adds a new dimension to our understanding of historical events, revealing the true nature of the villains responsible for humanity{\textquoteright}s worst epidemics. },
  year = {2013},
  journal = {Science Magazine},
  volume = {340 },
  pages = {1278-1282},
  doi = {10.1126/science.340.6138.1278},
  language = {eng},
}