At that time, they could only collect a small piece of ivory, so they returned in July 2021 for a complete specimen.
“You start to ‘expect the unexpected’ when exploring the deep ocean, but I’m still amazed that we found ancient mammoth tusks,” Haddock said. “Our work examining this exciting discovery has only just begun and we look forward to sharing more information in the future.”
It’s unlike anything he’s seen before, said University of Michigan paleontologist Daniel Fisher, who specializes in mammoth and mammoth studies.
“Other mammoths have been found from the sea, but generally not from depths of more than a few tens of meters,” Fisher said.
The statement said various research facilities were examining the dog to determine various information about it, including the animal’s age at death. The researchers say the cold, high-pressure environment helps preserve the dogs, so they can be studied in more detail.
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Scientists believe it could be the oldest well-preserved giant tusk found from this region of North America, and the UCSC Geochronology Laboratory estimates it to be over 100,000 years old after radioisotope analysis.
The researchers hope that the data collected will not only tell them more about the mammoths they found, but the species in general.
“Samples like this are a rare opportunity to paint a picture of a living animal and the environment in which it lives,” said Beth Shapiro, principal investigator in the Paleontology Laboratory at the University of California, San Francisco.
“Mamot remains from the North American continent are extremely rare, so we hope the DNA from these tusks will go a long way to improve what we know about mammoths in this part of the world.”
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