''Ursus dolinensis'' (the Gran Dolina bear) is an extinct

mammal Mammals () are a group of vertebrate animals constituting the class Mammalia (), characterized by the presence of mammary glands which in females produce milk for feeding (nursing) their young, a neocortex (a region of the brain), fur or ...

ian

carnivore A carnivore , or meat-eater (Latin, ''caro'', genitive ''carnis'', meaning meat or "flesh" and ''vorare'' meaning "to devour"), is an animal or plant whose food and energy requirements derive from animal tissues (mainly muscle, fat and other sof ...

species of the

Ursidae Bears are carnivoran mammals of the family Ursidae. They are classified as caniforms, or doglike carnivorans. Although only eight species of bears are extant, they are widespread, appearing in a wide variety of habitats throughout the Nort ...

family. Its

fossil A fossil (from Classical Latin , ) is any preserved remains, impression, or trace of any once-living thing from a past geological age. Examples include bones, shells, exoskeletons, stone imprints of animals or microbes, objects preserved ...

ized remains were unearthed from the lowest layers of the

stratigraphic Stratigraphy is a branch of geology concerned with the study of rock layers (strata) and layering (stratification). It is primarily used in the study of sedimentary and layered volcanic rocks. Stratigraphy has three related subfields: lithostrati ...

sequence at the archaeological and

paleontological Paleontology (), also spelled palaeontology or palæontology, is the scientific study of life that existed prior to, and sometimes including, the start of the Holocene epoch (geology), epoch (roughly 11,700 years before present). It includes t ...

site of Gran Dolina (also ''Trinchera Dolina'', a section of the ''Trinchera Ferrocaril'', lit. Railroad trenches), that is a part of the

Atapuerca Mountains The Atapuerca Mountains ( es, Sierra de Atapuerca) is a karstic hill formation near the village of Atapuerca in the province of Burgos (autonomous community of Castile and Leon), northern Spain. In a still ongoing excavation campaign, rich fos ...

complex in the

Burgos province The Province of Burgos is a province of northern Spain, in the northeastern part of the autonomous community of Castile and León. It is bordered by the provinces of Palencia, Cantabria, Vizcaya, Álava, La Rioja, Soria, Segovia, and Valladolid. ...

, northern

Spain , image_flag = Bandera de España.svg , image_coat = Escudo de España (mazonado).svg , national_motto = ''Plus ultra'' (Latin)(English: "Further Beyond") , national_anthem = (English: "Royal March") , i ...

. The species was described by Nuria Garcia and

Juan Luis Arsuaga Juan Luis Arsuaga Ferreras (born 1954 in Madrid) is a Spanish paleoanthropologist and author known for his work in the Atapuerca Archaeological Site. He obtained a master's degree and a doctorate in Biological Sciences at the Universidad Compl ...

in a 2001 publication. Skeletal fossils, mainly cranial fragments were recovered from the sediment units TD 3 and in particular TD 4 (TD = ''Trinchera Dolina''). Presence in these layers suggests a chronology in between 900,000 and 780,000 years ago, which falls into the Calabrian stage of the early

Pleistocene The Pleistocene ( , often referred to as the ''Ice age'') is the geological Epoch (geology), epoch that lasted from about 2,580,000 to 11,700 years ago, spanning the Earth's most recent period of repeated glaciations. Before a change was fina ...

Morphology

The species has been described as the most primitive of all

cave bear The cave bear (''Ursus spelaeus'') is a prehistoric species of bear that lived in Europe and Asia during the Pleistocene and became extinct about 24,000 years ago during the Last Glacial Maximum. Both the word "cave" and the scientific name ' ...

s, and smaller than a

black bear Black bear or Blackbear may refer to: Animals * American black bear (''Ursus americanus''), a North American bear species * Asian black bear (''Ursus thibetanus''), an Asian bear species Music * Black Bear (band), a Canadian First Nations group ...

. It has a slender body comparable to brown bears (''

Ursus arctos The brown bear (''Ursus arctos'') is a large bear species found across Eurasia and North America. In North America, the populations of brown bears are called grizzly bears, while the subspecies that inhabits the Kodiak Islands of Alaska is kno ...

'') and noticeably gracile features of the

cranial Standard anatomical terms of location are used to unambiguously describe the anatomy of animals, including humans. The terms, typically derived from Latin or Greek roots, describe something in its standard anatomical position. This position pro ...

and

mandibular In anatomy, the mandible, lower jaw or jawbone is the largest, strongest and lowest bone in the human facial skeleton. It forms the lower jaw and holds the lower tooth, teeth in place. The mandible sits beneath the maxilla. It is the only movabl ...

bones, that to some extent resemble those of ''

'' and ''

Ursus etruscus ''Ursus etruscus'' (the Etruscan bear) is an extinct species of bear, endemic to Europe, Asia and North Africa during the Pliocene through Pleistocene, living from ~5.3 million to 100,000 years ago. Taxonomy ''Ursus etruscus'' appears ...

''. Yet its overall morphological characteristics suggest a kinship with the line of the speleoid bears. Finally Garcia and Arsuaga have concluded that ''Ursus dolinensis'' "is the ancestor of ''Ursus savini'' and to be very close to the common ancestor of ''Ursus arctos''". Alveole zahn

The

type specimen In biology, a type is a particular wiktionary:en:specimen, specimen (or in some cases a group of specimens) of an organism to which the scientific name of that organism is formally attached. In other words, a type is an example that serves to a ...

of the Gran Dolina bear is a long left

mandible In anatomy, the mandible, lower jaw or jawbone is the largest, strongest and lowest bone in the human facial skeleton. It forms the lower jaw and holds the lower tooth, teeth in place. The mandible sits beneath the maxilla. It is the only movabl ...

fragment with the

acronym An acronym is a word or name formed from the initial components of a longer name or phrase. Acronyms are usually formed from the initial letters of words, as in ''NATO'' (''North Atlantic Treaty Organization''), but sometimes use syllables, as ...

''Ata96-TDW4-E9-1'', that retains the canine, a

premolar The premolars, also called premolar teeth, or bicuspids, are transitional teeth located between the canine and molar teeth. In humans, there are two premolars per quadrant in the permanent set of teeth, making eight premolars total in the mouth ...

4, a molar 2 and the

alveoli Alveolus (; pl. alveoli, adj. alveolar) is a general anatomical term for a concave cavity or pit. Uses in anatomy and zoology * Pulmonary alveolus, an air sac in the lungs ** Alveolar cell or pneumocyte ** Alveolar duct ** Alveolar macrophage * ...

of the premolars P1, P2 and P3. Several

paratype In zoology and botany, a paratype is a specimen of an organism that helps define what the scientific name of a species and other taxon actually represents, but it is not the holotype (and in botany is also neither an isotype nor a syntype). Of ...

fossils include an incomplete right

, a right lower molar, another lower molar, two jaw fragments, one

phalanx bone The phalanges (singular: ''phalanx'' ) are digital bones in the hands and feet of most vertebrates. In primates, the thumbs and big toes have two phalanges while the other digits have three phalanges. The phalanges are classed as long bones. ...

of the foot and a

metatarsal bone The metatarsal bones, or metatarsus, are a group of five long bones in the foot, located between the tarsal bones of the hind- and mid-foot and the phalanges of the toes. Lacking individual names, the metatarsal bones are numbered from the ...

. The discovery of a complete ''Ursus dolinensis'' skull during the 2012 excavation campaign and its analysis has according to the campaign's co-directors

Eudald Carbonell Eudald Carbonell i Roura (born 17 February 1953, Ribes de Freser, Girona) is a Catalan archaeologist, anthropologist and paleontologist. Educated in Girona, Barcelona and Paris, he holds a PhD in geology of the Quaternary from Pierre and Marie C ...

, J.M. Bermúdez and J.L. Arsuaga helped to better determine the species'

phylogenetic In biology, phylogenetics (; from Greek φυλή/ φῦλον [] "tribe, clan, race", and wikt:γενετικός, γενετικός [] "origin, source, birth") is the study of the evolutionary history and relationships among or within groups o ...

position. Nuria Garcia described more of the species' specific

morphology Morphology, from the Greek and meaning "study of shape", may refer to: Disciplines * Morphology (archaeology), study of the shapes or forms of artifacts * Morphology (astronomy), study of the shape of astronomical objects such as nebulae, galaxies ...

in a comparison with the ''Untermaßfeld bear'' at the ''18th International Senckenberg Conference'' in

Weimar Weimar is a city in the state of Thuringia, Germany. It is located in Central Germany between Erfurt in the west and Jena in the east, approximately southwest of Leipzig, north of Nuremberg and west of Dresden. Together with the neighbouri ...

in 2004. She confirms the primitive

brown bear The brown bear (''Ursus arctos'') is a large bear species found across Eurasia and North America. In North America, the populations of brown bears are called grizzly bears, while the subspecies that inhabits the Kodiak Islands of Alaska is kno ...

-like features and highlights detailed dental traits shared by the two species, such as a "slender horizontal

ramus Ramus can refer to: * A branch (botany) * A portion of a bone (from Latin ''ramus'', "branch"), as in the Ramus of the mandible or Superior pubic ramus * A nerve ramus such as the Dorsal ramus of spinal nerve * A taxonomic rank ("branch" in English ...

with straight vertical profile; all teeth sides converge towards the

midline In typography, the mean line is the imaginary line at the top of the x-height. upright 2.0, alt=A diagram showing the line terms used in typography Round glyphs will tend to break ( overshoot) the mean line slightly in many typefaces A typ ...

". The fourth lower

s are massive and elliptical shaped with a prominent

protoconid Many different terms have been proposed for features of the tooth crown in mammals. The structures within the molars receive different names according to their position and morphology. This nomenclature was developed by Henry Fairfield Osborn i ...

. The first lower molars are slender, the second lower molars are rectangular shaped and without medial constrictions. The fourth upper premolars are triangular shaped with simple high pointed cusps. The first upper molars are quadrangular to rectangular-shaped without central constriction and finally, the second upper molars are large without torsion.

Notes

; Footnotes

References

External links

* García, Nuria and Arsuaga, Juan Luis (2001). "Ursus dolinensis: a new species of early Pleistocene Ursid from Trinchera Dolina, Atapuerca (Spain) = Ursus dolinensis: une nouvelle espèce d'ursidé inférieur du Pléistocène Trinchera Dolina, Atapuerca (Spain)" . Comptes rendus de l'Académie des sciences. Série 2. Sciences de la terre et des planètes 332 (11). 1251–8050, 717-725 . {{Taxonbar, from=Q6158080 Pleistocene bears Pleistocene species extinctions Pleistocene carnivorans Prehistoric mammals of Europe Fossil taxa described in 2001 Ursus (mammal)