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Frozen bear mouth The frozen bear came with its teeth well preserved. (NEFU) An adult bear recovered from the Siberian permafrost in the Lyakhovsky Islands in 2020 is not, as originally thought, around 30,000 years old. In fact, its age is more in the region of 3,500 years old. That's the verdict of researchers from the North-Eastern Federal University in Russia, who carried out a new necropsy of the well-preserved specimen. It remains an incredible find, offering an intriguing window into a past that isn't quite as far back as presumed. Initially, the team thought they were dealing with a...

Separately at least one preserved carcass of a cave bear cub found on the mainland of Yakutia, with scientists hopeful of obtaining its DNA. More details of the finds are to be announced soon. Until now only the bones of cave bears have been discovered. The new finds are of ‘world importance’, according to one of Russia’s leading experts on extinct Ice Age species. Scientist Lena Grigorieva said of the island discovery of the adult beast: 'Today this is the first and only find of its kind - a whole bear carcass with soft tissues. 'It is completely preserved, with...

The perfectly preserved remains of an Ice Age cave bear have been discovered in the Russian Arctic -- the first example of the species ever to be found with soft tissues intact. The astonishing find was made by reindeer herders on the Lyakhovsky Islands, which are part of the New Siberian islands archipelago in Russia's Far North. The bear could be as much as 39,500 years old. Prior to this, only the bones of cave bears had been unearthed, but this specimen even had its nose intact, according to a team of scientists from the North-Eastern Federal University (NEFU) in...

Russian scientists on Monday showed off a prehistoric puppy, believed to be 18,000 years old, found in permafrost in the country’s Far East. Discovered last year in a lump of frozen mud near the city of Yakutsk, the puppy is unusually well-preserved, with its hair, teeth, whiskers and eyelashes still intact. “This puppy has all its limbs, pelage – fur, even whiskers. The nose is visible. There are teeth. We can determine due to some data that it is a male,” Nikolai Androsov, director of the Northern World private museum where the remains are stored, said at the presentation at...

Scientists are analyzing the perfectly preserved remains of a prehistoric horse in a bid to clone the now-extinct animal. Recently discovered in permafrost in the Siberian region of Yakutia, the skin, hair, hooves and tail of the carcass are all preserved. The remains are estimated to be 30,000 to 40,000 years old. Experts believe that the foal was about 2 months old when it died. Semyon Grigoryev, head of the Mammoth Museum in the regional capital of Yakutsk, was surprised to see the perfect state of the find. He noted it's the best-preserved ancient foal found to date. The Siberian...

The frozen carcass of the dark-brown baby horse is from an extinct species is up to 40,000 years old, and the animal was perfectly preserved in the Siberian permafrost in the Batagai crater in Yakutia, the coldest region in Russia. Leading researcher of the laboratory of Mammoth Museum Dr Semyon Grigoriev said: 'Fortunately, the animal's muscle tissues were undamaged and well preserved, so we managed to get samples of this unique find for biotechnology research.' South Korean cloning expert Professor Hwang Woo Suk, currently in Yakutsk, told The Siberian Times that a joint bid is underway to find a living...

Extinct woolly mammoths, cave lions and other long-gone species may be brought back to lifee in a new £4.5million cloning facility in Russia, scientists claim. The new Jurassic Park-style centre will be a "world class paleo-genetic scientific hub" in the world's coldest city, Yakutsk, in the remote north-east of the country. Vladimir Putin's exact plans will be unveiled in September at an investment forum but experts say the centre will aim "to study extinct animals from living cells - and to restore such creatures as the woolly mammoth, woolly rhinoceros, cave lion and breeds of long-gone horses". The cloning laboratories...

© North-Eastern Federal University ==================================================================== A three-month-old horse that lived up to 40,000 years ago has been discovered in the mysterious Batagai depression in Russia’s Yakutia region, nicknamed the ‘Gateway to the Underworld.’ The North-Eastern Federal University in Yakutsk published the first photo of the “unique” discovery, which was made together with scientists from Kindai University in Japan along with a crew from Fuji TV. The horse was unearthed in perfect condition with its mane, tail and hair well preserved, as it was trapped in the permafrost for 30,000-40,000 years, scientists say. The discovery can help scientists to learn...

A reported 200 bars of gold and other precious metals have scattered across an airport runway in Russia after a cargo plane door broke off upon takeoff. Strong winds blew off the Nimbus Airline An-12 cargo plane door upon takeoff from Yakutsk Airport, airport officials told Interfax on Thursday.  After the incident, the plane crew made an emergency landing in a village airport some 12 kilometers from Yakutsk.

MOSCOW: Temperatures reached -67 degrees Celsius in the remote Yakutia region in Russia on Tuesday, the Associated Press reported. Pictures circulating on social media showed people posing with frozen eyelashes as temperatures reportedly fell to -50 degrees Celsius. Temperatures reached -67 degrees Celsius in Yakutia on Tuesday (Jan 16). A video posted on Twitter also showed a cup of boiling water solidifying after being poured out of a window. Blasting boiled water at -46.5C 😄 #Yakutsk pic.twitter.com/G6OdsSiIZ0 — Bolot Bochkarev (@yakutia) January 13, 2018 Residents in Yakutia are normally used to the freezing conditions, with students routinely going to school...

Scientists in the Russian Far East have carried out a post-mortem examination of the remains of the only mummified dog ever found in the world. Found sealed inside permafrost during a hunt for traces of woolly mammoths, the perfectly-preserved body is 12,450 years old. The dog, believed to be a three-month-old female, was unearthed in 2011 on the Syallakh River in the Ust-Yana region of Yakutia, also known as the Sakha Republic. Experts spent the past four years analysing the body – which included not just bones but also its heart, lungs and stomach – but only carried out the...

Atlas Obscura on Slate is a blog about the world's hidden wonders. Like us on Facebook, Tumblr, or follow us on Twitter @atlasobscura.To watch the sun rise during winter in Yakutsk, you need to set your alarm clock for 10:40 a.m. In late December, the sun will appear a few minutes later, softly illuminating a few scurrying, fur-clad forms on the snowy fog-filled streets. Yakutsk, located in Yakutia, a republic in Siberia, is the world's coldest city. In January the mean temperature hovers around minus 40 F, but days in the negative 70s are not unheard of. At this level...