Woolly rhinos had a hump

Nov. 11 () –

Remains of a young woolly rhino discovered mummified in the permafrost of Yakutiain Siberia, have confirmed that these animals exhibited an upper hump behind the neck.

Previous finds of mummies of this extinct rhinoceros They had no hump or this area of ​​the corpse was damaged.

The hump of the studied rhino, which was about 4 years old when it died, It measures 36 cm long, 13 cm high and 14 cm thick, and is full of adipose tissue. The dimensions of the subcutaneous adipocytes and the hump probably indicate that the hump was filled with white fat.

The presence of a bulging hump in the woolly rhinoceros represents a distinctive adaptation that is not typical of today’s large mammals in northern latitudes and likely contributed to its survival during the harsh winters of the Ice Age, concludes the research, published in Quaternary Science Reviews.

This discovery demonstrates that the Paleolithic artists of the Chauvet cave made surprisingly accurate depictions of the exterior of a woolly rhinoceros, according to the authors, led by Gennady G. Boeskorov of the Institute of Diamond and Precious Metals Geology at the Russian Academy of Sciences.