Overview
- An international team led by Case Western Reserve University published the findings in The Anatomical Record.
- The analysis concludes that nearly half of Dunkleosteus’s skull was cartilage, including major jaw joints and muscle attachment sites.
- Researchers identified a large bony channel that housed a facial jaw muscle comparable to those in modern sharks and rays.
- Dunkleosteus lacked true teeth and instead used paired bone blades, a specialization interpreted as enabling bites from large prey.
- Work with the Cleveland Museum of Natural History’s extensive specimens reframes Dunkleosteus as an evolutionary outlier and broadens views of arthrodire diversity.