Researchers defend Chilean mummy study amid backlash

The authors, editors and publishers of a controversial paper describing the genome of an ancient Chilean mummy have defended the scientific ethics of the work.

Some researchers in Chile reacted angrily to the 22 March publication of the sequencing study, questioning the ethics of the work on the six-inch-long mummy.

Researchers based in the United States and Mexico carried out whole genome sequencing on a bone fragment from the humanoid skeleton that was discovered in 2003 in the Atacama desert in Chile. They determined that it was from the skeleton of a young girl who suffered from genetic bone conditions.