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Megalodons likely gave birth to large newborns about 13 feet long, roughly the size of today’s adult shark. Representational image: Megalodon, a giant prehistoric shark, ruled the oceans millions of years ago. iStock Megalodon, a giant prehistoric shark, ruled the oceans millions of years ago. The conventional view of megalodon as simply a larger version of the great white is now being challenged as new research has uncovered a more complex reality. Led by Professor Kenshu Shimada of DePaul University, a team of 28 experts from around the world analyzed a nearly complete vertebral column of a megalodon found in...

Jaws may have terrified you at the cinema, but the iconic great white would have been dwarfed by Carcharocles megalodon, the largest shark in the history of the planet. The giant creatures lived between 23 million and 2.6 million years ago and scientists are divided over how and why the species perished. Now, details of fossils from the huge shark that lived alongside the dinosaurs have been studied for the first time in an attempt to solve this mystery.