As an irrepressibly inquisitive child, I would pore over maps of the great Southern land imagining infinitely white vistas, ice-encrusted shorelines and flocks of bizarre creatures engaged in all manner of noisy rituals.

Then this fledgling student of geography, in the grip of idleness, would often identify the most isolated and unlikely points on the globe, vowing one day to venture to these invariably far-flung and often wholly inhospitable lands. Antarctica's treacherous, spiny tendril was one such irresistible location.

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It seems that the world’s cutest animals are the ones most threatened by those who love them most – us.

Of the seven short-listed finalists in the World Wildlife Fund’s (WWF) poll for the world’s cutest animal, half are endangered or under threat.

The huge arctic Polar Bear (Ursus maritimus) is one such contender. And just what is it about a giant, ferocious carnivore that can crush a seal’s skull with one blow from its massive paw that engenders such affection in another mammal (us) that would otherwise be its prey?

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