Megalodon didn't look like we imagined (4 photos)

The giant shark, which became extinct 3.6 million years ago, has become the subject of literary and cinematic legends, most recently in the 2018 sci-fi thriller Meg: Monster of the Deep. On the screens we saw a creature that looked like a giant white shark. However, an international study of megalodon found that it was much slimmer than previously thought.





The 2018 action film "Meg: Monster of the Deep" features a building-sized megalodon

The lack of fossil evidence has led paleontologists to suggest that the megalodon was similar to a great white shark and reached 20 m in length.

Now researchers from the University of California, along with a group of marine experts from around the world, believe that the killer shark was slimmer and perhaps even longer. They compared its vertebrae to that of a white shark.



University of California biologist and lead author of the paper Phillip Sternes holds a megalodon tooth.

The eureka moment came when scientists compared the white shark's teeth and spine to those of a megalodon and a reconstruction of its spinal column.

"Surprisingly simple evidence was on the surface that megalodon had a more slender body than a great white shark," says Professor Kenshu Shimada, whose new report is published in the journal Palaeontologia Electronica.





Study author Phillip Sternes explained: "It was still a giant predatory shark. However, the findings suggest that megalodon was not just a larger predecessor of the great white shark."

The elongated body required a longer digestive canal, so the formidable creature needed more time to digest food, and accordingly it ate less often.

"By taking longer to digest food, megalodon could go longer without hunting. This meant less predation pressure on other marine life," Sternes added. "If I had to eat just one whale every now and then, their populations would remain stable."



Previously, the reason for the extinction of the ancient species was called a natural reduction in prey in its habitat.

“I believe there were many factors that led to the extinction, but one of them could have been the emergence of a great white shark, which may have been more agile,” Sternes suggested. “Competition for food could have been one of the main factors in the death of megalodon.”

Researchers say this "major scientific achievement" may be just a small piece of history in need of rewriting.