By: Giovanni Ngai
On July 25, 2023, Otodus megalodon sharks were recently discovered to be warm-blooded animals in the ocean. People discovered that Otodus megalodons are warm-blooded. This discovery was made because something in their teeth tells the scientist that they are warm-blooded. Otodus megalodons, if you are not familiar, are the world’s biggest sharks. They have always been at the top of the food chain when they were around. You might ask how being warm-blooded would help or how that would have anything to do with a megalodon. Well, being warm-blooded helps the animal “swim longer and faster,” Jack Cooper said (Carolyn Gramling). You might also ask how they found out that megalodons were warm-blooded.
Well, scientists used the only evidence left of these fellow beasts, and it was their teeth. A tooth’s enamel contains isotopes, which are heavier and lighter forms of a chemical element. This kind of technique was sort of like an ancient thermometer. With this technique, Eagle’s team examined the chemically bonded forms of heavier-than-usual carbon and oxygen. Eagle is a marine biogeochemist; he studies the chemistry of ocean ecosystems. As a control sample, Eagle’s team took samples from mollusks that are 100% cold-blooded, which means they cannot control their body temperature. What they found out was that Otodus Megalodon’s blood was warmer than the ocean’s temperature. All this new knowledge came from the tooth of an Otodus megalodon.
How does the internal temperature of an Otodus megalodon compare to that of other sharks? One shark in particular is a major competitor of the Megalondons: the great white shark. To understand why there is competition between the two sharks, we must look at when they evolved. Megalodons arrived in the world around 23 million years ago, and great white sharks arrived in the world around Megalondon’s later year, around 3.5 million years ago. This made scientists think that there was competition for food. Megalodons were obviously a lot bigger, and they needed a lot more food to meet their energy needs. In addition, the climate changed during the Pliocene Epoch, which meant a smaller number of marine animals, which increased the competition for food. The megalodon ended up becoming extinct, but the great white shark still lives today.
Otodus megalodons were recently discovered by scientists to be warm-blooded animals. That may have explained why they were at the top of the food chain. But whether we discovered that O. megalodons were warm-blooded or not, they are still very competitive and superior animals.
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