SIRIUS /federal territory/, November 30. /TASS/. Russian scientists begin to sequence genomic DNA of Arctic animals - polar bears, walruses and extinct mammoths, Alina Dyomkina of the Biotechnical Campus genome laboratory said at a meeting between President Vladimir Putin and participants in the Congress of Young Scientists.

"We have launched a project to sequence genomes of Arctic species, which is specifically important for studying and preserving the biodiversity of a unique region like the Arctic," she said. "Right now we continue the initiative to work on the complete genomic sequencing of key species - the polar bear, the Atlantic walrus - and even the work with the ancient woolly mammoth's DNA."

The DNA has preserved due to the permafrost, she added.

Mammoths were among the largest megafauna representatives that inhabited Eurasia and North America during the last glaciation epoch. Their numbers were quite high only 50,000 years ago, however those proboscis animals disappeared quickly about 20-15 thousand years ago, when the glaciers began to retreat. Scientists still argue about exact causes of their extinction.

The 3rd Congress of Young Scientists runs at the Sirius Science and Arts Park on November 28-30. It is a key annual event of the Decade of Science and Technology. The event offers the largest platform for dialogues between advanced and fundamental sciences, the government and the economy's real sector. TASS is the congress' general information partner.