Please ensure Javascript is enabled for purposes of website accessibility
How Scary Was The Meg? UC Merced Prof Has Answers in Discovery's Shark Week Show
By admin
Published 2 years ago on
July 20, 2023

Share

Getting your Trinity Audio player ready...

Megalodon, the massive shark that ruled the world’s oceans for more than 20 million years before dying out 2 million years ago, has been a focus of research for UC Merced assistant professor Sora Kim.

“I did not start off as someone who was like, I’ve got to study sharks, I’m obsessed with sharks. But sharks are in fact quite fascinating in how they’ve been able to survive for so long.” — UC Merced assistant professor Sora Kim

And now her knowledge on the topic will get a wider audience — Kim and other experts will be featured on Discovery Channel’s Shark Week in a show called “Jaws vs. The Meg” that will air starting Sunday.

Kim didn’t know she would wind up being a megalodon expert when she was an undergraduate geology student at Dartmouth College, but when a U.S. Geological Survey geologist dug into a bank of the Chesapeake Bay in Maryland and unearthed a megalodon tooth, her interest was piqued, especially when she thought about a new way of studying it.

“I specialize in a method called stable isotope analysis, which most people don’t know anything about,” she said with a laugh. “And it is a way that we study what modern animals are eating or they might be moving. And then we also use the same method to study ancient organisms as well plants and animals and soils.”

A New Way to Look at Old Bones

Kim, whose research interests are paleoecology, climate change, environmental reconstruction, and stable isotope biogeochemistry, was interested in applying stable isotope analysis to research she was working on as a graduate student at UC Santa Cruz.

“I had this somewhat random idea that we could use it for fossils, shark teeth, because there were a lot of fossils, shark teeth around, and no one … had really probed what sharks were doing in the past with this method.”

UC Merced assistant professor Sora Kim with megalodon teeth and her analysis equipment. (UC Merced photo)

Over the years her interest in megalodon has continued to grow.

“I have to say, as the research has gone on, I’ve become more and more fascinated with megalodon, which I was not necessarily expecting. It is also the same in terms of how my journey has been with sharks. I did not start off as someone who was like, I’ve got to study sharks, I’m obsessed with sharks. But sharks are in fact quite fascinating in how they’ve been able to survive for so long. I think the most interesting and surprising work has been, we’ve been trying to develop these new methods to sort of see how high on the food chain Megalodon ate.”

The results were somewhat unexpected, especially in the variation in megalodon teeth and how warm-blooded the ancient shark was, Kim said.

Shark Shows Proliferate

Kim says people are fascinated by sharks, perhaps more so than other marine animals.

The public’s interest in megalodon and in sharks in general also has been fueled by shows like Shark Week on Discovery and Sharkfest on the National Geographic channel and also popular movies like “The Meg” and “Sharknado.”

“It’s really incredible how sharks capture the imagination and curiosity and maybe also play upon the fear of people, because there’s no other group of organisms that have two weeks of popular programming dedicated to them,” Kim said.

Scientists believe megalodons were about 50 to 60 feet long — that’s like two school buses — and two to three times the size of great white sharks, Kim said. Its size helped it stay at the top of the food chain for millions of years, but that size, and also its warm blood may have led to its demise, she said.

About 2.5 million years ago there was a period of climate change when “ocean gateways were opening and closing,” which affected the diversity and abundance of some marine animals, Kim said.

“When you’re that large and you have a high metabolic rate (because of warmer blood), you just have to eat a lot. And so if the environment is shifting and maybe your prey are becoming less abundant or changing where they’re at, that will sort of affect your ability to survive and maybe affect the competition that you have with other organisms around,” she said. “Another organism that happened to be around, that was today’s great white shark.”

Jaws v. The Meg

And what about that match-up between The Meg and Jaws? Back in the day, megalodon’s size advantage would have given it primacy over its great white shark adversaries.

But despite the number of horror films that depict ancient megalodons still lurking in the ocean’s depths, Kim says great white sharks have nothing to worry about. (Not as if they look like they worry about much.)

“While there are many parts of the ocean that are less explored, I think the sheer size of megalodon and what we know about shark ecology makes it impossible that we have not found megalodon if it’s still living,” she said.

Kim says she enjoys paddling around her backyard pool and also trips to the ocean, even though she knows that she may be sharing a patch of water with a known killer.

But sharks typically don’t find humans that tasty, Kim said.

“I actually do love the ocean. I find it very soothing and wonderful,” she said. “But I often wonder what is lurking below the water. And I’ve seen a lot of drone footage, even off the coast of California, of what’s out there.

“But in fact, I think that sharks are more scared of us than we should be of them. We have definitely done a lot more damage to their habitat and their lives than they have done to ours.”

Professor Sora Kim’s selfie with a model of a megalodon jaw behind her. (Sora Kim)

RELATED TOPICS:

DON'T MISS

Braves’ Jurickson Profar Hit With 80-Game PED Ban

DON'T MISS

Watch: City Demolishes Historic Chinatown Building to Make Way for Housing

DON'T MISS

The Mystery of Melania Trump’s Wedding Dress and an eBay Sale

DON'T MISS

Heading to Sierra? Prepare for Heavy Snow

DON'T MISS

Mexican National Caught in Fresno County Pleads Guilty to Fentanyl Trafficking

DON'T MISS

CA Snowpack Is Near-Average. What Does This Mean for Water Supplies?

DON'T MISS

Shohei Ohtani Adds Another No. 1 to His Resume: MLB’s Best-Selling Jersey

DON'T MISS

Tush Push Is the Hottest Topic at the NFL League Meetings

DON'T MISS

U.S. Bank Executive Terry Dolan Dies in Plane Crash Near Minneapolis

DON'T MISS

Trump Administration Will Review Billions in Funding for Harvard

UP NEXT

Heading to Sierra? Prepare for Heavy Snow

UP NEXT

Mexican National Caught in Fresno County Pleads Guilty to Fentanyl Trafficking

UP NEXT

U.S. Bank Executive Terry Dolan Dies in Plane Crash Near Minneapolis

UP NEXT

Former MLB Pitcher CJ Wilson of Fresno on New Torpedo Bats: ‘Still Room for Innovation’

UP NEXT

Who Is Fresno’s ‘Fake’ ICE Agent? He Speaks Up

UP NEXT

Fresno Police Arrest 12 for DUI, Plan More Enforcement Operations

UP NEXT

Collision Leaves Two Dead, Several Injured After Clovis Police Chase

UP NEXT

Valley Crime Stoppers’ Most Wanted Person of the Day: William Rodriguez Garcia

UP NEXT

Merced Police Chief: Local Sexual Assault Exams ‘Worth’ Higher Cost

UP NEXT

Anjelah Johnson-Reyes to Headline Chukchansi’s Summer Series with ‘Family Reunion Tour’

Heading to Sierra? Prepare for Heavy Snow

13 hours ago

Mexican National Caught in Fresno County Pleads Guilty to Fentanyl Trafficking

13 hours ago

CA Snowpack Is Near-Average. What Does This Mean for Water Supplies?

14 hours ago

Shohei Ohtani Adds Another No. 1 to His Resume: MLB’s Best-Selling Jersey

14 hours ago

Tush Push Is the Hottest Topic at the NFL League Meetings

14 hours ago

U.S. Bank Executive Terry Dolan Dies in Plane Crash Near Minneapolis

15 hours ago

Trump Administration Will Review Billions in Funding for Harvard

15 hours ago

Former MLB Pitcher CJ Wilson of Fresno on New Torpedo Bats: ‘Still Room for Innovation’

16 hours ago

Man Arrested After Shooting at Fresno’s Switch Nightclub

16 hours ago

Who Is Fresno’s ‘Fake’ ICE Agent? He Speaks Up

16 hours ago

Braves’ Jurickson Profar Hit With 80-Game PED Ban

NEW YORK — Atlanta Braves outfielder Jurickson Profar has been suspended for 80 games without pay for performance-enhancing drug use. Major ...

12 hours ago

Jurickson Profar
12 hours ago

Braves’ Jurickson Profar Hit With 80-Game PED Ban

12 hours ago

Watch: City Demolishes Historic Chinatown Building to Make Way for Housing

Photo of First Lady Melania Trump
13 hours ago

The Mystery of Melania Trump’s Wedding Dress and an eBay Sale

13 hours ago

Heading to Sierra? Prepare for Heavy Snow

Miguel Obed Romero Reyes, 25, of Sinaloa, Mexico, pleaded guilty Monday, March 31, 2025, to trafficking more than 200,000 fentanyl pills after authorities seized the drugs during a traffic stop on Interstate 5. (DOJ)
13 hours ago

Mexican National Caught in Fresno County Pleads Guilty to Fentanyl Trafficking

14 hours ago

CA Snowpack Is Near-Average. What Does This Mean for Water Supplies?

14 hours ago

Shohei Ohtani Adds Another No. 1 to His Resume: MLB’s Best-Selling Jersey

Philadelphia Eagles quarterback Jalen Hurts (1) lines up for the goal line Tush Push play during the NFL championship playoff football game against the Washington Commanders, Jan. 26, 2025, in Philadelphia. (AP File)
14 hours ago

Tush Push Is the Hottest Topic at the NFL League Meetings

Help continue the work that gets you the news that matters most.

Search

Send this to a friend