An international team, including researchers from the University of Granada, has discovered the world’s oldest known cases of breast cancer and multiple myeloma. The discoveries were made by conducting CT scans of two mummies found in the pharaonic necropolis of Qubbet el-Hawa in Aswan, Egypt.

The team, which included Professor Miguel Cecilio Botella López of the UGR’s Department of Legal Medicine, Toxicology, and Physical Anthropology, determined that the woman with breast cancer died around 2000 B.C., while the man with multiple myeloma died around 1800 B.C. Both individuals belonged to the ruling classes of the governing Egyptian families of Elephantine.

Read more from the University of Granada.