In the Russian Siberian republic of Yakutia , scientists at the North-Eastern Federal University ‘s Mammoth Museum continue to analyze the bodies of perfectly frozen prehistoric animals in the permafrost:
After mammoths, cave bears, woolly rhinos, cave lion cubs, wolves and prehistoric horses, scientists have conducted an autopsy of an ancient bison . During the autopsy it was possible to take samples of soft tissues, muscles, skin, wool and also extract the brain :
“Preliminarily, this is a young individual 1.5-2 years old. When she died has not yet been established. The geological age of the bison discovered in 2009 and 2010 was 8-9 thousand years, the biological age is about 2 months and 4-4.5 years, respectively. It can be said that the new find is intermediate in terms of biological age, thanks to which we can trace the ontogeny of the ancient bison. This bison was discovered in the summer of 2022 in the Verkhoyansk region in the new Khaastaakh locality and donated to the Mammoth Museum free of charge. So a special thanks to them. This summer we plan to visit the site where more fossil animal remains can be found ,” said Maxim Cheprasov , head of the NEFU Mammoth Museum.
Wood bison inhabited the territory of Yakutia in ancient times and are the most numerous species of mammoth fauna. Every year, Yakut paleontologists find about a hundred ancient bison bones, but no soft tissue.
