The recipe for a good viral usually includes a striking video or photograph, curious facts and, why not?, a little fiction. It should not be like that. However, consciously or unconsciously, the truth is that, more often than it should, viral videos and images are sustained in false ideas. And that is precisely what happens with the video of a shark of supposedly 80 million years that recently circulated on the internet.
The positive thing is that, in this case, it does not seem that the false information be deliberate, because it actually has an explanation. The shark specimen seen in the images is not 80 million years old. It is not known how many he has, but his life expectancy is infinitely lower. What happens is that they have found fossils of the same species that are 80 million years old.
This is equally fascinating, since we are talking about a species of shark that has hardly changed since the days when dinosaurs still roamed the Earth. But no, the specimens that are still alive today they are not that old.
An old shark, but not so much
Another of the most common ingredients in a viral video in its antiquity. Generally, they were recorded years ago, but for some time the interest of Internet users returns to settle on them much later.
In the case of the video of this old shark, it was recorded in 2007, in the Awashima Marine Park, in Japan. However, it has been on October 14 of this year when she has jumped to Twitter, in a publication that has already given her almost 9 million views.
As explained from IFLSciencethe animal in the images is a eel shark (Chlamydoselachus anguineus). It is a rare species, which is generally found at great depths, around the 1,500 meters. However, some much more superficial specimens have been seen, over 200 meters deep.
Dark brown in color, about 2 meters long and with a body similar to that of an eel, it is considered a living fossilbecause it still preserves the primitive characteristics that are observed in fossils of 80 million years old. This ranges from the aforementioned body shape to the presence of 300 trident-shaped teeth, arranged in 25 rows.
As for its age, logically in a video with the naked eye it is not possible to know how old the shark is. However, it is known that this species can live to approximately 25 years. Of course, there are other species of sharks that are much longer-lived, which come to be around 5 centuries. These attract a lot of attention from aging researchers, although they are difficult animals to study, especially because of how complicated it is to access them.
In any case, what is clear is that this viral video, for a change, has failed to ensure that the shark in question is 80 million years old. Sometimes with these things something like a broken phone happens. As the information circulates, it varies until it reaches a point where something like the age of a living animal is confused with that of animals. oldest fossilyes A small detail that makes the difference.