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A remotely operated submarine was collecting samples on a previously undiscovered deep ocean slew when it scoop up up a rare megalodon tooth .
The gold - colored tooth , which is 2.7 inches ( 6.8 centimeters ) long , was discovered more than 10,000 feet ( 3,090 meters ) below the surface near the Johnston Atoll in the Pacific Remote Islands Marine National Monument , around 800 miles ( 1,300 kilometers ) in the south of the Hawaiian Islands .
A remotely operated vehicle (ROV) collecting the megalodon tooth from a seamount.
investigator draw the find in a study published Dec. 14 in the journalHistorical Biology . The Ocean Exploration Trust , which led the 2022 expedition that come up the tooth , has now release video detail the events .
The find is the first in - situ observation and sample distribution of amegalodontooth in the deep sea , meaning researchers found the fossil in its original resting place . Most deep - sea fossils are collected by dragging nets along the ocean floor , so researchers miss out on crucial information such as their precise localization , consort to a financial statement released by the Ocean Exploration Trust on Jan. 4 .
Study co - authorNicolas Straube , an associate professor at the University Museum of Bergen in Norway , trace it in the statement as an " amazing find . "
The tooth after researchers scraped off a ferromanganese layer it was encased in.
" The fossil was discovered at a very remote deep - sea locality from which megalodon fossils are rarely documented , " Straube said .
Related : Could the megalodon still exist today ?
Megalodon ( Otodus megalodon ) was thelargest shark to have ever inhabit , growing up to at least 49 pes ( 15 MiB ) long and potentially up to 65 feet ( 20 m ) long . The monumental vulture were top of the ocean food chain from around 20 million years ago until their extermination around 3.6 million years ago .
Megalodon teeth are relatively common fossils — each megalodon had around 276 tooth , and they lived in oceans around the humankind . However , most of these fossils are discovered on ground near shorelines or rivers rather than in the bass sea , which is seldom explored , according to the statement .
investigator aboard the Ocean Exploration Trust ’s Nautilus exploration watercraft were pull together samples around the Johnston Atoll in June 2022 to study its thick - sea geology and biology . They deployed a remotely operated vehicle ( ROV ) shout out Hercules to take and collect the samples , which were then send to the University of Rhode Island for processing .
There , researchers found the tooth in one of the samples and surmise it add up from a megalodon . Study co - authorDave Ebert , a investigator at the Moss Landing Marine Laboratories in California , after confirmed the tooth came from a megalodon .
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Upon reviewing the video recorded by Hercules , the researchers also realized the tooth was visibly sticking out of the backbone on the seamount before the ROV shoveled it up . Discovering an in - situ tooth on a bass - sea mountain , or seamount , serve researchers memorise more about the gigantic shark ’s sea habits .
" This fossil provide us with authoritative insights into the distribution of megalodon , " study first authorJürgen Pollerspöck , a research worker at the Bavarian State Collection of Zoology in Germany , said in the statement .
" The sample indicates that megalodon was not a strictly coastal species and that this metal money migrated across ocean basin similar to many New - solar day mintage such as thegreat clean shark . "
