Shark attempts to break into diver's cage during documentary
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According to recent estimates, the deadly predators were thought to measure up to a 65ft length, and weighed over a staggering 50 tonnes. But now, all this ground scientists thought they made may have been lost. The latest breakthrough has revealed that this previous understanding does not have enough evidence to support it.
Currently, all we know for sure is large teeth (around seven inches) and jaws.
Megalodon actually translates as ‘large tooth’ from a compound of Greek root words.
We also know the earliest fossils date back 20 million years, and it is thought that they were huge predators that dominated the seas.
Phillip Sternes, a PhD candidate at the University of California, Riverside, was the lead author of the latest study.
He said: “This new study shows there are currently no scientific means to support or refute the accuracy of any of the previously published body forms of Megalodon.”
While the odd vertebrae here and there still remain, cartilage rarely survives fossilisation.
As it has not been possible to retrieve every part of the skeleton, all reconstructions of the likely giant creatures are merely speculations.
Mr Sternes said: “All previously proposed body forms of Megalodon should be regarded as speculations from the scientific standpoint.”
Researchers have tended to model megalodon bodies on great white sharks, in part as they are from the same Lamniformes order.
This order includes a number of many modern-day sharks, including the great white.
Both predators are also partially warm-blooded.
While reconstructions are speculative, a technique known as two-dimensional geometric shape analysis has been to recreate the suspected shape of the creatures.
But the new study has revealed that we are still not that close to discovering the true size of the elusive creatures.
Professor Kenshu Shimada, a co-author of the study from DePaul University, Chicago, said: “The study may appear to be a step backwards in science.
“But the continued mystery makes palaeontology, the study of prehistoric life, a fascinating and exciting scientific field.
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“This is exactly why the science of palaeontology continues to be an exciting academic field. We’ll continue looking for more clues in the fossil record.
“The fact that we still don’t know exactly how O. megalodon looked keeps our imagination going.”
The megalodon falls into the extinct family of Otodontidae.
These creatures diverged from the great white shark during the Early Cretaceous period which was around 145 million years to 100.5 million years ago.
Co-author Jake Wood, a graduate student in Prof Shimada’s lab, said: “It is still possible Megalodon could have resembled the modern Great White shark or lamnids.
“But our results suggest the two-dimensional approach does not necessarily decisively allow the body form reconstruction for Megalodon.
“Any meaningful discussion about the body form of Megalodon would require the discovery of at least one complete, or nearly complete, skeleton of the species in the fossil record.”
While the size is not clear, it was thought that the creatures were the largest predators to ever roam the seas.
It is thought that the megalodon was spread across the globe, from spots in the Caribbean and Mediterranean seas, in the Bay of Bengal, to along the coasts of California and southern Australia.
They even went as far as the coasts of northern Europe, South America, southern Africa, New Zealand, and East Asia.
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