By: Brady Cheng

The Otodus megalodon sharks – the biggest species of shark ever to ever roam the sea, were warm-blooded. Unfortunately, that fact is linked to their rise, and fall.

Most megalodons grew up to be 66 feet long. They were swift, fearsome predators who were at the top of the food chain. Chemical measurements on the fossilized megalodon teeth showed that they had higher body temperatures than the water, which helped them swim faster. Sadly, they needed so much food that they eventually grew extinct.

Robert Eagle explains why the megalodon needed so much food: “A creature’s metabolism is the set of chemical reactions needed to sustain life. Gigantic bodies require a lot of food to power their metabolisms,” he says. He explains that if O. megalodon wanted to live, they would have to eat a lot of food to not starve. The megalodon became one of Earth’s biggest carnivores but its voracious appetite led to its demise. Since bigger sharks, like the megalodon, have to eat more food than smaller sharks to sustain their metabolism, which is the set of chemical reactions needed to sustain life, they eventually grew extinct.

The megalodon had a large food supply for a long time because its higher body temperature allowed it to swim faster and find more prey. But since the megalodon’s prey disappeared three million years ago, it starved with the competition of the great whites, who also needed food to survive. “Some scientists suspect this competition helped drive O. megalodon to extinction, especially when food became scarcer. The climate changed during the Pliocene Epoch, which spanned 5.3 million to 2.6 million years ago. That led to a sharp drop in the numbers of marine mammals. They were a primary food source for both sharks.” says Carolyn Gramling. But the great whites survived, because they were much smaller than the giant megalodon and they needed less food to maintain their metabolism.