text: Scientists in Italy have extracted the oldest ever DNA sample to be taken from a Neanderthal. Calcium formations on ‘Altamura Man’ - a skeleton found in a cave in 1993 - suggest he was 128,000 to 187,000 years old. Now researchers plan to sequence his DNA to see if they can reveal new details about the evolution of our ancient ancestors. Scroll down for video . Calcium formations on ‘Altamura Man’, a skeleton found in a cave in 1993, suggest he was 128,000 to 187,000 years old. Now researchers plan to sequence his DNA to see if they can reveal new details about the evolution of our ancient ancestors. Researchers have, up until now, held off from excavating the remains as they believed it would cause irreparable to the skeleton. An earlier study of the head and part of a shoulder of suggested the skeleton belong to a Neanderthal. The current project has been ongoing for six years with researchers taking a tiny part of shoulder bone and analysing it in the lab. It is believed that Altamura Man was left in such a peculiar spot after falling in a well and getting stuck. Altamura is a city of Apulia, in southern Italy. It is believed that Altamura Man was left in such a peculiar spot after falling in a well and getting stuck . Researchers have, up until now, held off from excavating the remains as they believed it would cause irreparable to the skeleton. An earlier study of the head and part of a shoulder of suggested the skeleton belong to a Neanderthal. Pictured is ‘Altamura Man's’ skull from different angles . Scientists assume he starved to death, or died from lack of water - but not much else is known about his life. Analysis revealed that the calcite on skull was formed 172,000 to 130,000 years ago, during a period when ice sheets were expanding significantly from out of Antarctica and Greenland. The team say samples of DNA have also been retrieved from the sample, and because of the age, represent the oldest such samples ever recovered from Neanderthal remains. It has been around 30,000 years since the ancestors of modern-day humans are thought to have wiped out the ancient Neanderthals. But the extinct species could be taking revenge on us from beyond the grave by making us more vulnerable to potentially killer diseases such as cancer and diabetes. Neanderthals and modern humans are thought to have co-existed for thousands of years and interbred, meaning Europeans now have roughly two per cent Neanderthal DNA. These 'legacy' genes have been linked to an increased risk from cancer and diabetes by new studies looking at our evolutionary history. However, some genes we inherited could have also improved our immunity to other diseases. Scientists have found that part of our HLA system, which helps white blood cells to identify and destroy foreign material in the body, could have come from Neanderthals. Other researchers have suggested that humans outside Africa are more vulnerable to Type 2 Diabetes because they interbred with Neanderthals. Researchers from Oxford and Plymouth universities have also found that genes thought to be risk factors in cancer were present in the Neanderthal genome. If they manage to sequence the DNA, they hope it might reveal new details about the evolution of hominids in general and the early history of the Neanderthal. Separate research earlier this week found that Neanderthals suffered from a wide range of diseases that still plague us today - and this may be what killed them off. They have found evidence that suggests our prehistoric cousins would have been infected by diseases such as tuberculosis, typhoid, whooping cough, encephalitis and the common cold. But anthropologists from Cambridge University and Oxford Brookes University say that new diseases carried by modern humans may have led to the downfall of Neanderthals. Neanderthals are thought to have numbered up to 70,000 at their peak and lived in hunter gatherer societies .
target: Altamura Man was discovered in a cave in 1993 in southern Italy .
  Skeleton's calcium formations suggest it is 128,000 to 187,000 years old .
  Scientists have successful extracted DNA and are trying to sequence it .
  They say DNA might reveal new details about the evolution of hominids .