Moscow: The first intact adult head of an ice age wolf has been found, preserved in permafrost for 40,000 years.

Still covered in thick fur and sporting a vicious-looking set of fangs, the 38-centimetre-long head was found on the Tirekhtyakh river in the remote Siberian region of Yakutia by locals hunting for mammoth tusks last year.

Still covered in thick fur and sporting a vicious-looking set of fangs, the prehistoric wolf head was found in the remote Siberian region of Yakutia last year. Credit: Dr Albert Protopopov/The Siberian Times

Now Russian and Japanese scientists hope the find will help them learn more about an ancient predator that roamed Europe and Asia alongside the woolly rhinoceros and mammoth.

"We want to answer the question of whether these wolves disappeared or turned into modern wolves, how much they are related to modern wolves," Albert Protopopov, head of mammoth fauna studies at the Yakutia Academy of Sciences, said.