Two articles report the first direct genomic evidence that Yersinia pestis caused the Plague of Justinian and together revised views on how pandemics arise, recur, and spread, reported El Comercio.

Scientists solve the mystery of the Justinian Plague. They identify Yersinia pestis as the cause. The plague devastated the Byzantine Empire. DNA from a mass grave in Jerash, Jordan confirms this.

Scientists have gained some insight into one of the first known calamities to visit mankind: a two century-long pandemic caused by the bacterial disease plague. Studying the remains of plague victims, ...

Scientists have confirmed that Yersinia pestis, the bacterium behind later plagues like the Black Death, caused the Justinian Plague - the world’s first recorded pandemic 1,500 years ago. In an ...

For the first time, researchers have uncovered direct genomic evidence of the bacterium behind the Plague of Justinian — the world’s first recorded pandemic — in the Eastern Mediterranean, where the ...

TAMPA, Fla. (August 27, 2025) — For the first time, researchers have uncovered direct genomic evidence of the bacterium behind the Plague of Justinian — the world’s first recorded pandemic — in the ...

Scientists have unraveled a 1,500-year-old puzzle by identifying the cause of the “Plague of Justinian,” the outbreak regarded as the world’s first recorded pandemic. Researchers have now detected ...

Meet the Plague of Justinian, the Black Death’s older, but equally fatal cousin. Arriving in Constantinople around 540 AD, it killed up to 100 million people, contributed to the fall of the Roman ...