News Paleontology

An ancient shark’s weird fins helped it glide like a manta ray

Spanning nearly 2 meters, the fins’ length rivals the wingspan of bald eagles

reconstruction of an ancient eagle shark

Aquilolamna milarcae — nicknamed eagle shark for its long, curving fins (as seen in this illustration) — lived about 93 million years ago in an ancient sea in what is now northeastern Mexico.

R. Vullo et al/Science 2021

By Carolyn Gramling

- More than 2 years ago

Thirty million years before manta rays began gracefully gliding through ocean waters, a shark with fantastically elongated fins gave such underwater flight a go, researchers report in the March 19 Science.