A
new fossil discovery has helped quell 150 years of debate over the origin of
great white sharks.
Carcharodon hubbelli, which has been described by
US scientists, shows intermediate features between the present-day predators
and smaller, prehistoric mako sharks.
The
find supports the theory that great white sharks did not evolve from huge
megatooth sharks.
The
research is published
this week in the journal Palaeontology.
Palaeontologists
have previously disagreed over the ancestry of the modern white sharks, with
some claiming that they are descended from the giant megatooth sharks, such as
Megalodon (Carcharocles megalodon).
"When
the early palaeontologists put together dentitions of Megalodon and the other
megatooth species, they used the modern white shark to put them together, so of
course it's going to look like a white shark because that's what was used as a
model," explained Professor Dana Ehret of Monmouth University in New
Jersey who lead the new research.
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