UPPSALA, Sweden, March 24 (UPI) -- A Swedish-led study has determined brown bears from the Iberian Peninsula aren't as genetically different from other European brown bears as thought.

The researchers found the Spanish bear was only recently isolated from other European strains. They said their findings shed new light on the discussion of how to save the population of Spanish bears.

Scientists from Sweden, Spain, France, Germany and the United Kingdom extracted DNA and determined the gene sequence of bears from prehistoric material, primarily from the Iberian Peninsula. Some of the material was as much as 80,000 years old.

"We expected to be able to follow the Spanish brown bear far back in time but we found to our amazement that it had genetic material from bears in other parts of Europe," said Uppsala University doctoral student Cristina Valdiosera, who performed most of the laboratory and analytical work.

"These bears have possibly been isolated in Spain for a few thousand years, which is a very short period in an evolutionary perspective," said Assistant Professor Anders Gotherstrom, who directed the study.

The research is reported in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.