The Atlantic interviews Gill for piece on Alaskan mammoths’ final days
Jacquelyn Gill, a paleoecologist at the University of Maine, spoke with The Atlantic magazine for the article, “The lonely, thirsty, final days of the doomed Alaskan mammoths.” According to the article, a team of scientists led by a Pennsylvania State University researcher have determined what killed a group of the creatures stranded for millennia on an island no bigger than Disney World. The team found the mammoths survived on the island until 5,600 years ago, before going extinct most likely due to thirst brought on by a drying climate, the article states. “It’s a really tight story, with multiple lines of proxy evidence supporting the conclusions,” said Gill, who also has studied mega-beast extinctions. “It’s a likely model for extinction in the near future.” Gill’s interview with The Atlantic also was cited in a Washington Post article on the research.