LEIPZIG, Germany, Feb. 20 (UPI) -- A German-led study has identified a shift in a particular population of bears inhabiting a European valley during the late Pleistocene era.
The study led by Michael Hofreiter at the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Leipzig and used DNA obtained from the teeth of ancient cave bears.
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The researchers say their findings illustrate the ability of DNA sequence analysis to reveal aspects of animal population dynamics in the distant past and potentially illuminate the influence of human migrations in animal population changes.
The research appears in the journal Current Biology.
