Megalodon: A giant transoceanic predator

Context

Using fossil evidence to create a three-dimensional model, researchers have found new evidence about the life of one of the biggest predatory animals of all time — the Megalodon.

About Megalodon 

• According to the study, the Megalodon was bigger than a school bus at around 50 feet from nose to tail. 
• In comparison, the great white sharks of the present can grow to a maximum length of around 15 feet. 
• Using their digital model, the researchers have suggested that the giant transoceanic predator would have weighed around 70 tonnes — or as much as 10 elephants.
• Megalodons roamed the oceans an estimated 23 million to 2.6 million years ago.
• Using a previously established relationship between speed and body mass, researchers calculated that the Megalodon had an average cruising speed faster than sharks today. 
• The Megalodon had the ability to migrate across multiple oceans.

About 3D modeling research

• The technique was used as the Megalodon’s skeleton is made of soft cartilage that doesn’t fossilize well. 
• Using fossils that were available, including mainly teeth and a rare collection of vertebrae that has been with a Belgium museum since the 1860s, computer modelling was used to reconstruct the entire body of the extinct and largest known macropredatory shark.
• The model was completed by adding ‘flesh’ around the skeleton using a full-body scan of C carcharias (great white shark).