Megalodon Shark Tooth

Creator

Preview

Photo Credit

Meredith C. Swartwout, Ph.D. Candidate, Biological Sciences

Object Type

Fossil Oceanic Specimen

Date

Spring 2021

Description

This incredible tooth belongs to a prehistoric Megalodon shark. Like other sharks, Megalodon shed their teeth throughout their life and replaced them, meaning that there are a lot of fossil shark teeth still out there to find. Unlike our extant, or living, sharks today, though, their teeth were massive! Using their fossilized teeth, scientists estimate that Megalodon may have been the largest predator on Earth by weight, and they were approximately 2-3x bigger than our largest living shark today, the Great White shark [1].

[1] https://www.nhm.ac.uk/discover/megalodon–the-truth-about-the-largest-shark-that-ever-lived.html

Object Housed

University of Arkansas Museum

Object Accession Number

0000-371-3