What caused the woolly mammoth’s extinction? - Wrangel Island, Siberia

[Oxytropidoceras]

DNA from mammoth remains reveals the history of the last surviving population

The mammoths of Wrangel Island purged a lot of harmful mutations before dying off.

Jeannete Timmons, Ars Technica, June 29, 2024

 

Did inbreeding cause the woolly mammoth’s extinction?

Our research suggests it was more sudden than that

Marianne Dehasque and Love Dalen, The Conversation, June 27, 2024

 

The open access paper is:

 

Dehasque, M., Morales, H.E., Díez-del-Molino, D., Pečnerová, P.,

Chacón-Duque, J.C., Kanellidou, F., Muller, H., Plotnikov, V.,

Protopopov, A., Tikhonov, A. and Nikolskiy, P., 2023. Temporal

dynamics of woolly mammoth genome erosion prior to extinction. Cell.

 

Yours,

 

Paul H.

Edited June 29 by Oxytropidoceras
formatting chnages and revised titke