BBC aired this news today on TV, but I am unable to link to the story found here under
Prehistoric shark caught on film (the link does not seem to work for me.. ) :
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/default.stm

Anyway, I uploaded what BBC reported this morning here:
http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x11ywn_ra...-film-jan-24-20

However, I found a bit more information on this shark from ITV:

Remarkable pictures of a rarely-seen shark, whose species has swum the Earth's seas since prehistoric times, have been released. The 1.6 metre long deep sea frill shark was first spotted swimming in the shallows by a fisherman in Japan.
It is very unusual for the creatures to be seen alive and experts believe a seasonal up-current carried the shark from its deep sea habitat to the shallows.This particular shark was a female weighing up to 7.5 kilograms. It has six gills and bizarre forked teeth.
Fossil records can be found of the animal dating as far back as 80 million years ago.
However the shark was unable to survive outside its deep sea environment and died after soon after capture.
Source - as well as a VIDEO link there to watch:
http://www.itv.com/news/world_c74c4483c3a1...d5583b4b30.html

Another story about this shark found here:


'LIVING FOSSIL': A frilled shark, rarely seen alive because its natural habitat is deep under the sea, has been captured on film by Japanese marine park

http://www.stuff.co.nz/3939077a12.html

Edit.. looks Like BBC did get the link to work finally.

This is a very interesting find. But what bothers me is that their default reaction was to try to capture it and put it in a tank. They should have known it was unlikely to survive. Maybe they were running out of things to cut up at the oceanarium. Who knows how many are alive in the sea. It would have been best to get the footage and leave it be.

Theres another thread on this and I think the shark was sick and on it's last legs anyway. Thats why it was at the surface, it was dieing.

The shark wasn't purposely caught. It accidently got caught in nets. Or that's what they said on BBC news tonight.

80 million years old living fossil must be good find. But why is it always the japs that find the good stuff?

They find the good stuff because of there fishing industry, it's masive.

Japan does not have the worlds greatest reputation with marine wildife care.

What an ugly looking creature !! Figures why it's rarely seen out and about....It probably suffers from an inferiority complex !!

Yeah, this was quite interesting. I think it really was dying anyway; it certainly looked stressed out. I don't think that it's correct to call this things a "living fossil" because the "scientific evidence" that suggests that life on this planet dates back "millions" of years is, putting it mildly, dubious.

KGS

i agrre, its freekin uglie. half the bodie just hung there.japan has probably the worst reputation for marine wildlife care.

It's a living fossil because we have fossils of it dating from 80 million years ago. There's nothing dubious about it. The evidence is rock solid. Pun intended.

No it is not dubious at all actually. You should maybe learn something about real science, not the "science is out to get us" fundamentalist nonsense.

What happened at Nagasaki and Hiroshima? The fish died because the light killed it. The plankton that the teeth catch are not on the surface also. Watch the video and notice that the mouth never closes. That is because the mouth acts as a scoop. Same thing with the gills. When the food of the fish is gone it will rise to the top to get more because that is the only other place it can go to look for food; it can't go deeper. It's 4th cousin 50,000 times removed probably is 80 Million years old.

No the mouth is open to in take water to pass over its gills. This is called Ram Ventilation. It is common amongst shraks as they are heavier than water and sink if they don't swim, so swimming (dynamic lift, like a plane) lets them control their position in the water column and uptake oxygen with out much effort. Also look at those teeth, they are not the teeth of a planktonavour and they live at depths where you do not get plankton.

That is one mean looking shark!

I like him

I'm not like that, but I'm not afraid to question science. I question EVERYTHING. 80 million years is a long ass time, and long enough for some huge variable that we don't know about to come along and screw up any possability we have of accurately dating anything that far back. And it's VERY possible this is the case. Which is why I don't put too much into dating back longer than a few hundred thousand years.

Why it is perfectly accurate (give or take a few hundred years, which when your talking about millions of years is not much at all)

There's no way to know in my opinion. Any variable within that loooooong period of time could have come along unnoticed to us and changed the way it all works out. And it's a possability in the least.

Ugly looking thing but impressive to see a living fossil.... makes one wonder anew about what is really down there

*gets an attack of the heebie jeebies*

No really they are actually accurate, what is going to alter the rate of radioactive decay?

Who knows? That is your assignment today, get busy!

What a cool looking shark though, it is amazing the things that are lurking in the oceans... especially what we haven't seen yet.

Well I know dating by radioactive decay would not be allowed to be used as evidence if it was accurate. Strata that the animal is found in is also a very good indicator, the strata between differnet periods of time is quite distinct and many periods have distinct boundries, like the KT (cretaceous/tertiary) has a distinct clay boundry and geologist have spent plenty of time analysising the stratas and having them dated.

Nothing can throw radioactive dating techniques noticeably, especially since different samples are tested...

Man that's one fugly shark.

Maybe, but where it came from, I don't think that looks really mattered, did it?

KGS

nice find, new marine species are found from time to time, and the japs wouldnt be too much caring about it, if you can eat it, fish it (even if only 1% of the whole fish is human comestible)

I know, Japans fisheries policy is a disgace, this species ain't new however, we have known about it for quite some time.