Frozen baby Mammoth

Frozen Baby Mammoth to Shed Light on Climate Change
Hiroko Tabuchi, Associated Press

Jan. 4, 2008 -- Frozen in much the state it died some 37,500 years ago, a Siberian baby mammoth undergoing tests in Japan could finally explain why the beasts were driven to extinction -- and shed light on climate change, scientists said Friday.

The 6-month-old calf, unearthed in May by a reindeer herder in northern Siberia's remote Yamal-Nenets autonomous region, is virtually intact and even has some fur, though the tail and ear of the animal dubbed "Lyuba" were apparently bitten off.

"Lyuba's discovery is an historic event," said Bernard Buigues, vice president of the Geneva-based International Mammoth Committee. "It could tell us why this species didn't survive ... and shed light on the fate of human beings."

The last of the ancient beasts are thought to have roamed the earth from about 4.8 million years ago to 4,000 years ago, and researchers have debated whether their demise was due to climate change or over-hunting by humans.

"This is what we've all been waiting for -- the chance to explain everything about the mammoth," said Naoki Suzuki of the Jikei University School of Medicine, who is leading the first phase of an international study of the carcass's structure.

"Our findings will be a big step toward resolving the mystery of their extinction," Suzuki told a press conference in Tokyo.

The 4-foot gray-and-brown mammoth underwent a computed tomography scan that produced 3-D pictures with an almost surgical view, Suzuki said.
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40,000 year old frozen baby mammoth unearthed

In “Ice Baby” by Tom Mueller, the May 2009 issue of National Geographic announces the recent discovery of a 40,000 year old baby mammoth in Sibera. She is called Lyuba, named after the wife of the Nenet reindeer herder who found her, and is in near-pristine condition, having even her eyelashes. In fact, besides most of her wooly coat being gone, the only pieces missing (part of her tail and right ear) were destroyed after her recovery. Even so, she is undoubtedly the most complete specimen of mammoth to date.

Of course, paleontologists such as Dan Fisher, who has spent his entire life studying Pleistocene mammoths and mastodons, are excited by this find because Lyuba provides the most complete set of data it is possible to obtain, and all from one animal. Before, Fisher and his colleagues had been forced to infer certain states of health from fossils (primarily teeth) by comparing against similar findings in the mammoth’s closest relative, the elephant. But Lyuba was so well-preserved that Fisher was able to scan her, take tissue samples, and even retrieve stomach contents.

A three-day autopsy, during which Lyuba was allowed to partially thaw to facilitate more invasive procedures, indicated that Lyuba was a well-fed one-month old mammoth at the time of her death, indicating that death was accidental. Supporting these findings was a dense mix of clay and sand in her mouth and throat, which she likely inhaled after falling into riverbank mud, leading to suffocation, but also the probable cause of her excellent preservation. Dense mud would have sealed out oxygen and prevented aerobic microbes from decomposing her soft tissue, and then lactic acid-producing microbes colonized her tissues, effectively “pickling” her carcass. Later, the ground turned to permafrost, freezing her as well.

Following Lyuba’s article in National Geographic is another article entitled “Recipe for a Resurrection” (also by Tom Mueller), which discusses the possibilities for cloning extinct species such as mammoths and Tasmanian tigers. Pointing to the recent success of Teruhiko Wakayama’s team in cloning mice that had been frozen for 16 years, and the recent publishing of 70 percent of the mammoth genome by a team led by Webb Miller and Stephan C. Schuster, the article details the hurdles that still remain in accomplishing this long hoped-for feat.

Oddly enough, though cloning offers no hope of bringing back the same individual organism, the article ends with a pro-death quote from Tom Gilbert, “an expert in ancient DNA at Copenhagen University who with Schuster and Webb pioneered the harvesting of mammoth DNA from hair,” who “questions both the utility and wisdom of cloning extinct species. – ‘If you can do a mammoth, you can do anything else that’s dead, including your grandmother. But in a world in global warming and with limited resources for research, do you really want to bring back your dead grandmother?’”

The Field Museum in Chicago is planning an exhibition tour starring Lyuba in 2010, with assistance from the National Geographic Society.