TB is ancient disease. 50 million people are suffering from TB.10 Million people with positive sputum. 5, 00,000 deaths /every year. It is Gram positive Non Motile, non-sporing acid fast bacilli it spreads by cough, laugh, talking but not transmitted by kiss. For centuries, tuberculosis was a major killer disease, but the introduction of streptomycin in the late 1940s followed by isoniazid and in 1960s of rifampin, and ethambutol, revolutionized therapy, and tuberculosis came to be regarded as easily treatable condition. About one-third of HIV-associated deaths are caused by TB. The disease is out of control in many countries and is now the world's leading cause of death from a single agent. Mycobacterium tuberculosis, is the etiology agent of tuberculosis, the dread disease called consumption in Dickens time. One of the oldest and most devastating of human afflictions, tuberculosis remains a leading cause of infectious deaths worldwide today. From an ancient texts and historic documents, Medical historians have uncovered a wealth of information about the history of the disease. Now these written records are being supplemented by powerful new methods for studying impact that diseases have had on people and populations in the past. One of these new methods is ancient DNA analysis, writes Professor of Molecular Archeology Terry Brown.