One of the largest sharks to navigate our planet’s oceans throughout history, the megalodon is often depicted as a gigantic version of one of today’s biggest predators, the great white shark. However, scientists only know of the existence of this great shark, which lived 3.6 million years ago, thanks to some fossil teeth and spines.
In other words, we don’t know if it’s real, even though Hollywood painted this image. But a new study argues we have no idea what the megalodon looked like.
DePaul University palaeobiologist and co-author Kenshu Shimada, said in a press release, “This work may seem like a step back in science,” added: “But the continuing mystery is the study of paleontology, the study of prehistoric life, the fascinating and makes it an exciting field of science.”
The research, which appears Feb. 6 in the journal Historical Biology, re-evaluated a previous study that claimed that the megalodon’s body shape may be related to the way it regulates its body temperature. Megalodon belonged to a shark order known as the lamniformes and is believed to be partly warm-blooded. The old study argued that we could make a credible case for the physiology of the megalodon by comparing it to today’s warm-blooded sharks. The new study argues that the premise is invalid.
The researchers write that whether a shark is warm-blooded or cold-blooded has little effect on body shape, at least when viewed in two dimensions.
By comparing ancient teeth with those of other members of the megalodon family, scientists can draw inferences about the size of the megalodon based on fossil teeth. Some of these estimates suggest that the megalodon reached almost 20 meters in length, being about three times larger than a great white.
But James Wood, a DePaul graduate student and co-author of the study, said in a press release, “Any meaningful discussion of Megalodon’s body form would require the discovery of at least one complete or nearly complete skeleton of the species in the fossil record. Therefore, it is not possible to say that the depictions made so far are correct.”
In short, we still seem to know very little about the megalodon, although some guesses have been made. Learning more will only be possible if a near-perfect fossil is found.
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