How long do you think a shark would live? Recently a scientific study was published where a group of scientists has said that they might have found the oldest living vertebrate. A Greenland shark over 500 years. The sharks are also called gurry or grey sharks. Until recently scientists had difficulty finding out the life span of these animals who are found in the Arctic and North Atlantic oceans.
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Carbon dating does have an error margin and it’s important to know that too. Therefore the test that had come out had an error margin of about 120 years. And according to it the age of the shark would be something from about 272-512 years.
Steven Campana who is a shark expert at the University of Iceland had said that for many decades the fish biologists had tried to find the age of sharks but had not been successful. He had also said that it’s unbelievable that they did not know whether the main predator of the Arctic waters lived for 20 or 1,000 years.
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A Ph.D.student who had been a part of this team Julius Nielsen, a Danish marine biologist had said that it’s important to keep in mind that there may be some uncertainty in the estimated age. But still, they would be the oldest living vertebrates on earth as the shortest they could live is for 272 years.
h/t: [International Business Times, Live Science]
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