Woolly Mammoth: Secrets from the Ice Page #4

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That's fantastic.

This is just incredible and very,

very beautiful as well.

Under this ultraviolet light we can

see this detail within the tusk

that is a thing of great beauty,

but underneath that beauty,

inside that beauty,

is this information

about this mammoth's life.

'Drilling out tiny amounts of

ivory from daily growth lines

'allows Dan's team to analyse

chemical isotopes

'laid down on that day,

painting a prehistoric picture

'of the animal's life

with a level of detail

'that's not possible for

any other extinct species.

'Oxygen isotopes,

from the water it drank,

'reveal where the mammoth roamed

throughout its life.

'Nitrogen isotopes reveal

where a mammoth was

'getting its protein from.

'We can even pinpoint exactly

'when an infant was

weaned from its mother's milk.

'Carbon isotopes show the types and

relative quantities of plants eaten.

'Thinner and darker growth lines

'indicate winters when less food

was available,

'and in some cases,

periods of starvation.

'Because the growth lines are

so detailed,

'Dan can identify the point when,

upon reaching sexual maturity,

'teenage male mammoths

were cast out from their herds

'and left to find food

for themselves.

'It's also possible to see

that sexually mature males

'starved themselves every year,

during the period known as musth,

'just as living elephants do.

'This sees them all consumed

by the desire to find a mate.

'They fail to eat and their tusks

show a period of decreased growth.

'The tusks also bear witness

to traumatic events,

'including the most

spectacular of all sights

'a battle between males

competing for mating rights.

THEY TRUMPE:

THEY GROWL:

HE TRUMPETS:

HE TRUMPETS:

The study of mammoths

is nothing new.

They were first described

scientifically over 200 years ago.

But now new techniques in DNA

analysis are being used to

decipher the mammoth genome.

'Here

at America's Penn State University,

'geneticist Stephan Schuster

runs a team

'of DNA specialists who are using

cutting edge 21st century

'technology to analyse mammoth DNA.

'Their results are pushing

our understanding of mammoths

'far beyond what was

previously possible. '

How difficult is it to extract

DNA from a mammoth?

It's actually, it's quite difficult

because there's only tiny

amounts of DNA left.

At the same time you need to imagine

that all the bacteria

that lived on that animal deposit

their own DNA on top of the DNA

coming from the animal.

'DNA contains the

genetic instructions

'used in the development

and functioning of all animals,

'but it deteriorates very

quickly after death.

'In the case of long dead mammoths,

many of the remains recovered

'provide virtually no usable DNA,

'so Schuster uses the plentiful

supply of mammoth hair as a source. '

So take me through the process

of extracting DNA from a mammoth.

It's actually quite surprising,

it's not so unlike what you would do

with your own hair.

So first we wash it, we rinse it

with water, we shampoo it,

in the end we even bleach it.

And then we use an enzyme to

digest the hair shaft,

and we release the mammoth DNA

that's stored on the inside.

'Genetics labs commonly use

bone as a source of ancient DNA.

'But frequently contaminated,

'mammoth bones often provide

little useable DNA.

'Schuster's use of mammoth hair

'provides a surprisingly

pure sample. '

In one instance we working

on an individual

that was 18,000 years old,

and we could get more than 90

percent of mammoth DNA from it,

and the oldest specimen that we

sequenced

was roughly 60,000 years old, and

there we still get

more than 50 percent that

is endogenous mammoth DNA.

'Genetic analysis has dispelled

a myth about the very source

'from whence the DNA comes

mammoth hair.

'Mammoths have traditionally

been depicted as having

'orange-brown hair.

'It's now known that they

possessed similar genes to

'humans for hair colouration.

'Theoretically they could have been

blonde, ginger, or brunette.

'Whatever the colour,

the quality of the coat was crucial.

'Like the Arctic musk ox, mammoths

sported double layered coats.

'Short, dense, downy hairs next to

the skin provided insulation.

'Long, shaggy guard hairs kept out

the wind, rain and snow.

'Thick hair is an obvious cold

weather adaptation,

'but now advances in

genetic studies provide us

'with detailed insights

into molecular level adaptations,

'allowing mammoths to cope with

the extremes of the Ice Age.

'Dr Kevin Campbell of Manitoba

University in Canada investigates

'how their blood evolved to cope

with the freezing conditions. '

What I'm really interested in

is the protein haemoglobin,

the primary component of the blood.

This protein is really

the interface between the atmosphere

and the cell, you know,

it's that transporter protein

of all the oxygen in the body.

'Kevin usually studies mice, and

how the haemoglobin in their blood

'delivers oxygen to their cells,

especially in cold weather. '

'But his childhood obsession with

mammoths prompted him

'to try to see if he could figure

out how well the haemoglobin

'in mammoth blood worked

in the extreme cold of the ice age.

'However, blood dries up and

decomposes quickly,

'so no mammoth haemoglobin

has survived

'in any of the specimens

discovered so far.

'But, because Kevin had

the mammoth instruction

'manual in the form of their decoded

DNA, he was able to compare

'their code for making haemoglobin

with that of their close relatives,

'modern elephants. There were only

four differences between the codes.

'This enabled Kevin to use host

bacteria to produce

'his very own protein based

on modified elephant DNA.'

And effectively we turned it into

mammoth DNA. Functional mammoth DNA.

A functional protein that has been

extinct for thousands of years.

For thousands of years.

A functional protein that hasn't existed in any

animal for thousands of years, that's amazing,

it's starting to sound a

bit like Jurassic Park.

And it's not even just

functional it's authentic.

This is, in essence,

virtual time travel.

The end product is precisely

the same, had I gone back in time

and taken a blood sample,

it is absolutely authentic.

That's absolutely remarkable

and once you've got the mammoth

haemoglobin then you can test it,

you can see how it does.

You can look at how it picks up

oxygen and how it lets go of it.

Precisely the same way as I would

take it from your blood.

'In most animals, haemoglobins

ability to deliver oxygen

'to body tissues decreases

at low temperatures.

'To see if mammoth blood had any

special adaptations to the cold,

'Kevin tested the haemoglobin

he'd created

'across a range of temperatures. '

And sure enough, when we looked

at the haemoglobin of the mammoth

versus that of the living animals,

at normal body temperature,

around 37 degrees Celsius,

their properties were the same.

It has the same abilities to pick up

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