are pandas bears ? know one seems to know?

The giant panda is closely related to the other animals we call bears. The lesser panda is more closely related to the raccoon. The giant panda has evolved some features that distinguish them from all other bears, including teeth that are more suitable for eating bamboo. Therefore there were debates as to whether the giant panda was more closely related to the less panda or to the bears. In the 1970's Allan Wilson and his fellow scientists at UC Berkeley came up with a molecular technique that compares the serum albumin of different animals by making antibodies to the albumin and then compare how strongly the antibodies react with the serum albumin of different species. It was a somewhat crude technique compared to what scientists do today, but the results obtained by this method have more often than not been corroborated by newer methods.

The albumin tests conclusively showed that the giant panda is more closely related to bears than it is to the lesser panda. BTW, using the same technique, Wilson and his colleagues also confirmed that chimpanzees are the closest living relatives of human beings and that we last shared an ancestor with chimps about 5 million years ago. Molecular data alone, however, cannot settle the question of whether the giant panda is really a bear, or just a very close relative of the ancestor of all the other bears. Therefore, despite the fact that many were convinced by the molecular data since the 1970's, a small number continue to argue that morphologically it may not be as close to the bears as the molecular data suggests. For example, although the chimp is closer to humans than to the gorilla in terms of molecular data, morphologically the chimp is closer to the gorilla because the ape lineage has not evolved much compared to the fast evolving hominid lineage. Therefore one must find convincing evidence that the giant panda has actually evolved many morphological features of bears, and there is little question that it has, because its tail is similar in length to the other bears, and its small ears and bear-like paws leave little doubt that it is also a bear morphologically.

There has been a lot of debate about this for a long time, but following lots of DNA sequencing and analysis the consensus is that they are bears and are now classified as part of the bear family Ursidae.

The entire panda genome has now been sequenced

http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v463/n7279/fu...

Yes. It is the koala that is NOT a bear but rather a marsupial. Pandas are an asian bear mostly found in China.

Yes, Pandas are actual bears, but Koala bears are not BEARS.

They defitnley are, it was a question on who wants to be a millionaire before and I play sporcle and type of bears was on a random quiz, and panda was defitnley on it:D