It’s an ode to DNA.
A new study sheds light on how Ludwig van Beethoven died almost 200 years ago — a puzzle that many have been interested in solving.
Using five strands of the German composer’s hair for a DNA analysis, scientists were able to determine his likely demise was liver failure caused by chronic drinking. They also found other contributing factors that included a genetic predisposition for liver disease and that the artist had hepatitis B.
“With Beethoven in particular, it is the case that illnesses sometimes very much limited his creative work,” Axel Schmidt, one of the study’s authors and a geneticist at University Hospital Bonn in Germany, told the Associated Press. “And for physicians, it has always been a mystery what was really behind it.”
Before his death at the age of 56 in 1827, Beethoven himself requested in 1802 that “his disease be described and made public,” according to the study, which was published Wednesday in journal Current Biology. The influential composer had health issues, including slowly losing his hearing until he went deaf around the age of 44.
Work on the study began in 2015.
“Most people who do genetic testing for fun, including myself, will find that there is nothing wrong with them, they are related to everyone they thought they were, and the results are not surprising,” said lead author Tristan Begg. “But in this study we had fascinating results in every branch we looked at, from disease risk to the family tree.
“After eight years, that was very exciting.”
According to the study, researchers deduced that Beethoven’s deafness was not genetic and also found there were no genetic markers for abdominal pains that caused a lingering sour note in the composer’s 20s.
In the summer of 1821, Beethoven began suffering from bouts of jaundice, which according to the CDC causes the whites of a person’s eyes to seem yellow and can be a symptom of liver disease.
“We found that Beethoven had a genetic predisposition for liver disease,” according to the study. “Metagenomic analyses revealed furthermore that Beethoven had a hepatitis B infection during at least the months prior to his death.”
The study went on to say that Beethoven’s alcohol consumption, in addition to other factors, lead to his death by cirrhosis in 1827.
Research also suggested that within Beethoven’s family tree, a child may have been born from an affair, according to the AP.
“We hope that by making Beethoven’s genome publicly available for researchers, and perhaps adding further authenticated locks to the initial chronological series, remaining questions about his health and genealogy can someday be answered,” Bregg concluded.