How a lock of Beethoven’s hair gives clues to the possible causes of death of the famous composer of the Ninth Symphony

beethoven he had a probable genetic predisposition to liver disease and a hepatitis B infection months before his death, according to a newly released study.

An international team of researchers led by the University of Cambridge analyzed eight strands of hair held in public and private collections, to sequence the composer’s genome in an attempt to shed light on his health problems.

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The researchers considered that five locks were “authentic” and they came from a single European man.

Lead author Tristan Begg said the genetic risk factorswith him Beethoven’s High Drinkingmay have contributed to his liver disease.

The so-called Halm-Thayer lock and the Bermann lock of what is believed to be Beethoven’s hair. (KEVIN BROWN/UNIVERSITY OF CAMBRIDGE).

Ludwig van Beethoven was born in Bonn (Germany) in 1770 and died at the age of 56 in Vienna.

Begg said the team surmised his drinking was common from the composer’s “conversation books,” which he wrote in the last decade of his life. However, the volumes he consumed are difficult to estimate.

A scientist examines the Moscheles lock, believed to be from Beethoven’s hair, in a laboratory at the Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History. (SUSANNA SABIN/UNIVERSITY OF CAMBRIDGE)

“Although most of his contemporaries claim his consumption was moderate by early 19th-century Viennese standards, he probably amounted to amounts of alcohol known today to be liver-damaging,” Begg said.

“If your alcohol use was heavy enough over a long enough period of time, the interaction with your genetic risk factors presents a possible explanation for your cirrhosis,” he said.

The Stumpff lock is one of five pieces of Beethoven’s hair studied in an attempt to determine the composer’s health problems. (ANTHI TILIAKOU/UNIVERSITY OF CAMBRIDGE).

The team said, based on genomic data, that Beethoven’s gastrointestinal problems were not caused by celiac disease or lactose intolerance.

“We cannot say definitively what killed Beethoven, but now we can at least confirm the presence of a significant hereditary risk and infection with the hepatitis B virus,” said Johannes Krause of the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Germany.

Krause maintained that they were able to rule out several other less plausible genetic causes.

The prodigious composer and pianist suffered a progressive hearing losswhich began in his mid to late 20s and led to his functional deafness in 1818.

Investigators were unable to establish a definitive cause of his hearing loss.

“Although no clear genetic basis for Beethoven’s hearing loss could be identified, the scientists caution that such a scenario cannot be strictly ruled out,” said Axel Schmidt, from the Institute for Human Genetics at the University Hospital Bonn.

The so-called Stumpff lock, believed to be from Beethoven’s hair, was used to sequence the composer’s genome. (KEVIN BROWN/UNIVERSITY OF CAMBRIDGE).

Genetic genealogists have also identified what they describe as an “extra-partner paternity event” – that is, a child resulting from an extramarital affair – in Beethoven’s direct paternal line.

“We hope that by making Beethoven’s genome publicly available to researchers, and perhaps by adding more authenticated strands to the initial time series, remaining questions about his health and genealogy may one day be answered,” Begg added.

Source: Elcomercio