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However, viruses are still poorly understood and may have arisen before "life" itself, or may be a more recent phenomenon. Major extinctions in terrestrial vertebrates and large amphibians. Earliest examples of armoured dinosaurs. 195 Ma First pterosaurs with specialized feeding (Dorygnathus). First sauropod dinosaurs.
However, since the sharks’ presence in the fossil record has mostly consisted of isolated teeth, scientists have been left to speculate on what the rest of this ancient predator looked like ...
An analysis of a partially complete tail fin fossil shows that Cretoxyrhina had a lunate (crescent-shaped) tail most similar with modern lamnid sharks, whale sharks, and basking sharks. The transition to tail vertebrae is estimated to be between the 140th and 160th vertebrae out of the total 230, resulting in a total tail vertebral count of 70 ...
Unlike other fish, shark gill slits are not covered, but lie in a row behind the head. A modified slit called a spiracle lies just behind the eye, which assists the shark with taking in water during respiration and plays a major role in bottom–dwelling sharks. Spiracles are reduced or missing in active pelagic sharks. [28]
For generations raised on dinosaur toys, “Jurassic Park” films and characters like Barney, it's hard to imagine a world where dinos and their fossils didn't exist — or, more accurately ...
A team of scientists recently captured the elusive bluntnose sixgill shark, a deep-sea fish that has been on Earth before dinosaurs, on film.
A possible explanation is an increased competition by sharks, Teleostei, and the first Plesiosauria. Like the dinosaurs, the ichthyosaurs and their contemporaries, the plesiosaurs, survived the Triassic–Jurassic extinction event, and quickly diversified again to fill the vacant ecological niches of the early Jurassic.
Within cartilaginous fish, approximately 7 out of the 41 families of neoselachians (modern sharks, skates, and rays) disappeared after this event and batoids (skates and rays) lost nearly all the identifiable species, while more than 90% of teleost fish (bony fish) families survived. [86] [87]