Read on Twitter
Wow! For the first time, the preserved body of an extinct cave bear has been found in the permafrost in Russia. Scientist Lena Grigorieva says, "It is completely preserved, with all internal organs in place including even its nose." https://siberiantimes.com/other/others/news/first-ever-preserved-grown-up-cave-bear-even-its-nose-is-intact-unearthed-on-the-arctic-island/
The preserved body of a cave bear cub was also recovered! The remains were found by reindeer herders and they will be analyzed by scientists at the North-Eastern Federal University (NEFU) in Yakutsk, where scientists have been conducting research on woolly mammoths and rhinos.
Male cave bears stood up to 11.5 ft. tall when rearing up. The largest known specimen weight 2,200 lbs. Avg. male weighed between 770 and 1,300 lbs. (pic from http://prehistoric-wildlife.com )
Cave bears went extinct around 25,000 years ago, but their image was captured in Paleolithic carvings and cave paintings like this masterpiece from Chauvet Cave, painted ~32,000 years ago in France. Pic by Jean Clottes.
Research published in 2018 found that some cave bear DNA lives on in modern brown bears, similar to the way some humans carry around a bit of Neanderthal DNA. #CaveBear https://www.nytimes.com/2018/08/27/science/cave-bears-dna-extinction.html?smid=tw-share
