Massive Megalodon Tooth Found 10,000 Feet Beneath Ocean Surface

A giant fossilized tooth has been found on the ocean floor in the central Pacific. The tooth, discovered 10,000 feet beneath the water's surface, is believed to have belonged to the extinct megalodon, one of the largest marine predators to have lived.

The tooth has been identified by Katie Kelley and Rebecca Robinson, professors of oceanography at the University of Rhode Island, who are now conducting further tests to confirm their finding.

It was discovered in the summer during an Ocean Exploration Trust expedition to the Pacific Remote Islands Marine National Monument, which stretches over 495,000 square miles. The find was unveiled on Wednesday on the trust's Facebook page, Nautilus Live.

"The tooth very much looks like a megalodon tooth to me based on its size and serrations alone," Jack Cooper, a researcher in paleobiology at Swansea University in the U.K., told Newsweek.

"To my knowledge, this is the first tooth found in this area—or at least the first one publicly documented. If that's true, then this extends megalodon's range even further than originally thought."

Megalodon fossils have been found all over the world, with the earliest dating back nearly 23 million years. "Some areas with high abundances of megalodon teeth include North and South Carolina, Baja California, Maryland and Peru," Cooper said.

"What's particularly interesting about this location to me is how remote and way out in the ocean it is, compared to the generally coastal habitats megalodon teeth are found in. This suggests to me that the shark might have been migrating across the ocean when it lost that tooth."

If the fossil is confirmed as a megalodon tooth, this could provide direct evidence to support a theory put forward by Cooper and his Swansea colleague, Catalina Pimiento, that the megalodon migrated across the ocean to exploit a range of different feeding grounds.

Megalodon means "large tooth"—and it certainly lives up to the name. "There are a few clear characteristics of megalodon teeth. Most notably their enormous size; often as big as an adult person's hand," Cooper said. "They can also be identified by their sharp serrations on the side of the teeth and the presence of a distinct dental band near the root."

Fossil evidence has led researchers to estimate that the monster fish grew up to 65 feet long, with jaws that could open 11 feet wide. The megalodon likely ate large fish species, including other sharks, and there is evidence of megalodon tooth marks on the bones of numerous fossilized whales.

"Based on stomach calculations from our 3D modeling work, an adult megalodon of 15 to 20 meters could potentially have eaten prey of up to 8 meters long—as big as a killer whale," Cooper said. "Megalodons of such size likely needed to eat as much as 98,000 calories every day to sustain their huge size."

This feeding capacity offers further support to the theory set out by Cooper and Pimiento. "Eating a big whale...would have given [the megalodon] lots and lots of energy to partake in a long-distance migration, like the one this particular shark might have been undertaking when it lost that tooth."