2023-10-23 18:05:02
Panoramic view of the summit of Salin Volcano – UNIVERSITY OF NEBRASKA LINCOLN
MADRID, 23 Oct. (EUROPA PRESS) –
Mouse mummies have been discovered on the dry, windswept peaks of the volcanoes of the Puna de Atacamain Chile and Argentina.
This inhospitable region is considered the closest thing on Earth to the surface of Mars due to the thinness of its atmosphere and frigid temperatures.
According to research published in the journal ‘Current Biology’they interpret that the animals got there by themselves, which expands the physiological limits of vertebrate life on Earth.
At their extreme heights of more than 6,000 meters above sea level, experts had concluded that mammalian life was simply not possible. “The most surprising thing about our discovery is that mammals can live on the summits of volcanoes, in an environment as inhospitable as Mars,” he says. it’s a statement Jay Storz, lead author and biologist at the University of Nebraska (United States)–. Well-trained mountaineers can tolerate such extreme elevations during a one-day summit attempt, but the fact that mice actually live at such elevations shows that we have underestimated the physiological tolerances of small mammals.”
Storz and his colleagues discovered the first mouse mummy on the summit of Salín Volcano by chance, when they stumbled upon the stuffed corpse at the edge of a rock pile. But, now that they knew what to look for, it didn’t take long for them to find others.
“When my climbing partner and I started searching the rest of the rocks, we found seven more mummies on the same summit,” Storz recalls.
Then they began to systematically search the summits of all the Andean volcanoes. So far, they have searched the summits of 21 volcanoes, 18 of them over 6,000 meters high. In total, they have found 13 mummified mice on the summits of several volcanoes with an altitude of over 6,000 meters. In some cases, the mummies were accompanied by the skeletal remains of many other mice.
Radiocarbon dating showed that the mummified mice found on the summits of two volcanoes were at most a few decades old. Those from a third site were older, with an estimated age of 350 years at most. Genetic analysis of the summit mummies showed that they represent a species of leaf-eared mouse called ‘Phyllotis vaccarum’, which is known in lower areas of the region.
“The discovery of mouse mummies on the summits of these icy, windswept volcanoes was a big surprise,” says Storz. “Combined with our records of live capture of mice on the summits and flanks of other volcanoes,” Storz said. high altitude Andean “We are accumulating more and more evidence that there are long-term resident populations of mice living at extreme elevations.”
The discovery now raises important questions, including how mammals can live in a barren world of rock, ice and snow where temperatures never rise above freezing and about half the oxygen is available at sea level. It is not clear why the mice would have climbed to such heights. It is known that more than 500 years ago the Incas performed human and animal sacrifices on the summits of some Andean peaks. However, the researchers point out that the mummified mice from the summits of the volcanoes could not have been transported there by the Incas, since none are old enough to have coexisted with them.
Researchers are studying whether high-altitude mice possess special physiological traits that allow them to survive and function in low-oxygen conditions. To find out, they are conducting physiological experiments with captive mice collected in high-altitude areas.. They also continue their mountaineering studies on small mammals in the high Andean peaks of Argentina, Bolivia and Chile.
“With our biological mountaineering studies in the Andes, we continue to make surprising new discoveries about the ecology of extreme high-altitude environments,” concludes Storz.
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