第1750期:Scientists Study Brown Bear Frozen for 3,500 Years

A team of Russian scientists recently examined something extremely unusual: the frozen body of a brown bear that lived thousands of years ago. The cold preserved the body almost perfectly in the frozen lands of eastern Siberia for almost 3,500 years. Maxim Cheprasov is the laboratory chief at the Lazarev Mammoth Museum Laboratory at the North-Eastern Federal University in Yakutsk, eastern Siberia. "This find is absolutely unique: the complete body of an ancient brown bear," he said. In 2020, reindeer herders found the female bear on an island in the Arctic Ocean. Part of the animal was sticking out of the frozen ground, or permafrost, on Bolshoy Lyakhovsky Island. The island is around 4,600 kilometers east of Moscow.

一组俄罗斯科学家最近检查了一些非常不寻常的东西：一头生活在数千年前的棕熊的冰冻尸体。寒冷将尸体几乎完美地保存在西伯利亚东部的冰冻土地上近 3,500 年。马克西姆·切普拉索夫 (Maxim Cheprasov) 是位于西伯利亚东部雅库茨克的东北联邦大学拉扎列夫猛犸象博物馆实验室的实验室主任。 “这个发现绝对是独一无二的：一具古代棕熊的完整身体，”他说。 2020 年，驯鹿牧民在北冰洋的一个岛屿上发现了这只母熊。在 Bolshoy Lyakhovsky 岛上，这只动物的一部分从冻土或永久冻土中伸出来。该岛位于莫斯科以东约 4,600 公里处。

Because it was found just east of the Bolshoy Etherican River, it has been named the Etherican brown bear.Low temperatures helped preserve the bear's soft tissue for 3,460 years. It also let the scientists know about its final meals - bird feathers and plants. The bear is 1.55 meters tall and weighs nearly 78 kilograms. "For the first time, a carcass with soft tissues has fallen into the hands of scientists, giving us the opportunity to study the internal organs and examine the brain," said Cheprasov. The scientific team in Siberia looked at the bear’s brain, skin and internal organs so they could study its cells, genes, viruses and other organisms that lived inside it.

因为它是在 Bolshoy Etherican 河以东发现的，所以被命名为 Etherican 棕熊。低温帮助熊的软组织保存了 3,460 年。它还让科学家们知道了它的最后一餐——鸟的羽毛和植物。这只熊身高1.55米，体重近78公斤。 Cheprasov 说：“这是第一次，带有软组织的尸体落入了科学家的手中，让我们有机会研究内脏和检查大脑。”西伯利亚的科学团队观察了这只熊的大脑、皮肤和内脏，以便研究它的细胞、基因、病毒和生活在它体内的其他生物。

"Genetic analysis has shown that the bear does not differ in mitochondrial DNA from the modern bear from the north-east of Russia – Yakutia and Chukotka," Cheprasov said. He said the bear was about three to four years old when it died from an injury to its back. It is unclear how the bear came to be on the island, which is now divided from the mainland by a 50-kilometer-wide body of water. It may have crossed over ice, it might have swum over, or the island might still have been part of the mainland. The Lyakhovsky Islands contain some of the richest treasures in the world for the field of paleontology. The area attracts both scientists and ivory traders hunting for the remains of woolly mammoths, a kind of hairy elephant that disappeared long ago.

“基因分析表明，这只熊的线粒体 DNA 与来自俄罗斯东北部的现代熊——雅库特和楚科奇熊没有区别，”Cheprasov 说。他说这只熊因背部受伤而死亡时大约三到四岁。目前尚不清楚这只熊是如何来到岛上的，该岛现在与大陆被 50 公里宽的水域隔开。它可能已经越过冰层，可能已经游过，或者该岛可能仍然是大陆的一部分。 Lyakhovsky 群岛拥有世界上古生物学领域最丰富的宝藏。该地区吸引了寻找猛犸象遗骸的科学家和象牙贸易商，猛犸象是一种很久以前就消失了的毛茸茸的大象。