Russia finds fresh mammoth carcass.

This discovery is raising hopes of cloning this Ice Age animal.

On May 30, Russian scientists announced the discovery of a perfectly preserved woolly mammoth carcass, with its flesh still fresh and blood still flowing, on a remote island in the Arctic. This finding is raising hopes of cloning this Ice Age animal.

The carcass of a mammoth has just been found by Russian scientists (Photo: AP/Rossiya)

"The reason the mammoth carcass is in such good condition is because it was trapped and preserved in a block of pure ice," said Semyon Grigoryev, director of the Mammoth Museum and leader of the Russian scientists' expedition to the Lyakhovsky Islands, off the coast of Siberia.

"A quantity of dark blood was found in the abdominal cavity of this mammoth. When we broke through the layers of ice in the elephant's belly, the blood flowed out," Grigoryev said in a statement released by the North-Eastern Federal University in Yakutsk.

Woolly mammoths are thought to have become extinct around 10,000 years ago, although scientists still believe that a small group of mammoths may have lived longer in Alaska and on islands off the coast of Siberia.

To date, scientists have deciphered many of the genetic codes of this giant woolly mammoth from strands of hair on its head. Some scientists believe that it might be possible to clone this species if living cells of it were found.

The temperature at the time the mammoth remains were unearthed was between -7 and -10 degrees Celsius.

Researchers collected blood samples from this mammoth and sent them to Yakutsk for testing for bacteria and to detect dangerous infections.

The muscle tissue of this mammoth carcass was also in perfect condition. "The fragments of muscle tissue we found had the natural red color of fresh meat," Grigoryev said.

Reaching heights of up to 4 meters and weighing around 10 tons, mammoths were giant animals that roamed vast lands between the United Kingdom and North America. To date, the main causes of mammoth extinction are attributed to human activity and climate change.

According to VOV - VT