Strange and mysterious animal that was seen in the mountains of China

A Bear The brown panda, an extremely rare subspecies, was recently spotted in the Qianling Mountains of Shaanxi province. China, this is the first Visit It is the eleventh to be discovered in the region since 2018 and the first since the subspecies was discovered in 1985.

According to the National Forestry and Grassland Administration, the existence of brown pandas in the region was confirmed by images taken by an infrared camera in the Changqing National Nature Reserve on January 17. China

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The population of these pandas is very limited, estimated at only 20 individuals.

The Quinling brown panda was initially discovered in 1985, and since then, all images of this subspecies have been taken in this area.

A study led by the Academy was conducted in March this year China

and published in the journal PNAS highlighted that a genetic mutation is responsible for its distinctive brown color. The research identified a homozygous deletion in the Bace2 gene in the two brown pandas analyzed, a mutation that was not found in the other 227 pandas studied.

To verify this mutation, CRISPR-Cas9 gene editing technology was used in mice, resulting in mice with similar color, thus confirming the effect of the deletion in the Bace2 gene on the panda’s color.