This is a vial of blood from the frozen carcass of a 10,000 year old Siberian mammoth.
A Russian team from Yakutsk found the carcass in the frozen tundra of the New Siberian Islands.
"We suppose that the mammoth fell into water or got bogged down in a swamp, could not free herself and died. Due to this fact the lower part of the body, including the lower jaw, and tongue tissue, was preserved very well," they told The Siberian Times.
The upper torso and legs of the animal were eaten away after it was stuck, but they are hopeful that they can learn more about how these huge animals survived in the freezing temperatures of Siberia.
The secret could be in their blood.
"We were really surprised to find mammoth blood and muscle tissue," researcher Semyon Grigoriev, head of the Museum of Mammoths at North Eastern Federal University in Russia, told The Siberian Times.
(Read the full story at The Siberian Times)
"It is the first time we managed to obtain mammoth blood. No-one has ever seen before how the mammoth's blood flows," he said. "For now our suspicion is that mammoth blood contains a kind of natural anti-freeze."
(Read the full story at The Siberian Times)
"We have taken all possible samples: samples of blood, blood vessels, glands, soft tissue, in a word — everything that we could."
(Read the full story at The Siberian Times)
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