Researchers Uncover Travel Routes of Mammoths through DNA Analysis of Tusks

KOMPAS.com – Researchers managed to find the travel routes of mammoths that roamed North America more than 14,000 years ago through their tusks.

According to researchers the mammoth came from western Yukon.

Also read: What are the new facts about woolly mammoths?

This animal then traveled hundreds of kilometers through northwestern Canada before arriving at an ancient human settlement in what is now Alaska.

In that place, the mammoth’s journey ended. It seems he was massacred by a group of hungry hunter-gatherers.

The story of the mammoth’s epic journey was discovered after an international research team from McMaster University, the University of Alaska Fairbanks, and the University of Ottawa studied mammoth tusks using ancient DNA and isotope analysis.

Analisis mammoth

Quoting IFL Science, Thursday (18/1/2024) this complete tusk belonged to a woolly mammoth named “Élmayuujey’eh”. The creature was unearthed alongside the remains of a baby and juvenile mammoth at Swan Point, an archaeological site in Alaska.

Isotope analysis is then able to provide precise insights into animal life such as diet, geographic origin and migration patterns.

This can be done by looking at the concentration of certain stable isotopes in animal tissue taken from the surrounding environment.

Analysis of the tusk also shows that the mammoth was an adult female who was 20 years old when she died about 14,000 years ago.

This was a critical period when the last remaining woolly mammoths lived side by side with the first humans to inhabit the Alaska region, for at least 1000 years.

Also read: Fossil Mammoth Bones in New Mexico Reveal Human Massacre

Mammoths are known to have spent most of their lives in relatively small areas of the Yukon.

But as he grew older, he migrated 1000 kilometers in just three years before settling in the middle of Alaska.

Overall, this information strongly suggests that mammoths were killed by human hunter-gatherers.

“The mammoth was a young adult in the prime of its life. Its isotopes showed it was not malnourished but it died and its tusks were found at Swan Point, which was a hunting camp,” explained Mattew Wooller, researcher and director of the Alaska Stable Isotope Facility.

Researchers also think it is also plausible that the two young mammoths found near Élmayuujey’eh were his children.

It is believed that mammoths behaved like modern elephants, with females and their calves living in close-knit groups and adult males traveling alone.

“This analysis of mammoth movements can really help our understanding of how humans and mammoths lived in the Alaska region,” added Tyler Murchie, a researcher from McMaster University’s Department of Anthropology.

This study was published in the journal Science Advances.

Also read: Mammoth Tooth Found at Building Construction Site in Iowa, Here’s What It Looks Like

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2024-01-22 02:00:00
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