Till date only the length of the legendary giant shark Megalodon had been estimated. But now according to a new study which is led by the University of Bristol and Swansea University has revealed the size of the rest of its body, including fins that are as large as an adult human.
There is a grim fascination in determining the size of the largest sharks, but this can be difficult for fossil forms where teeth are often all that remain.
In today’s time the most fearsome living shark is the Great White, at over six metres (20 feet) long, which bites with a force of two tonnes.
Its fossil relative, the big tooth shark Megalodon, star of Hollywood movies, lived from 23 to around three million years ago, was over twice the length of a Great White and had a bite force of more than ten tonnes.
The fossils of the Megalodon are mostly huge triangular cutting teeth bigger than a human hand.
Jack Cooper, who has recently completed the MSc in Palaeobiology at the University of Bristol’s School of Earth Sciences, and colleagues from Bristol and Swansea has used a number of mathematical methods to pin down the size and proportions of this monster, by making close comparisons to a diversity of living relatives with ecological and physiological similarities to Megalodon.
