Reasons of pathologies of yakutian mammoths’ tusks in late pleistocene by data of isotopic and geochemical investigations

Among the remnants of Late Pleistocene mammals collected on the coast of the Laptev Sea, there are the tusks of woolly mammoth (Mammuthus primigenius) with abnormalities. An analysis of the isotopic composition of carbon from their bone carbonate hydroxylapatite, as well as geochemical studies of the substance of such tusks (35 items, a total of 38 samples) by x-ray fluorescence method was conducted. Significant differences in the chemical composition of the tusks with abnormalities and “normal” tusks in such the elements as Sr, Mg, Si, Al, Mn, Fe, Zn, etc. were revealed. An attempt to express the obtained anomalies of the chemical composition in the terms adopted in the description of microelementoses was made. It was determined that most studied mammoths lived in the cold epochs, however, the pathology of the tusks were observed for animals living both in the cold and warm epochs of the Late Pleistocene. The causes of occurrence of pathologies probably were linked to different types of physiological disorders affecting the growth and development of the tusks and, possibly, with changes in the geochemical background influencing the population of woolly mammoth in the North of Yakutia.