Sharks
Goblin shark
Mitsukurina owstoni
Epipelagic zone · Mesopelagic zone · Bathypelagic zone
Nicknamed the "alien shark", it projects its jaws out of its head at blinding speed to catch prey — one of the strangest attacks in the animal kingdom.
🗺️ Geographic range
Scattered worldwide in deep water, with notable sightings off Japan, Portugal and the Gulf of Mexico.
📊 Population
No precise global population figure; listed as least concern by the IUCN for lack of evidence of decline, despite how rarely it is observed.
Habitat
- Pacific Ocean · High seas / open water · Mesopelagic zone · Permanent
🥚 Reproduction
Probably ovoviviparous, like other sharks in its family.
Behaviour
- Diet
- Fish, squid and crustaceans, caught by jaw projection.
- Hunting
- Ambushes, using electroreception along its long snout to detect prey.
- Communication
- Unknown.
- Social life
- Solitary, very rarely observed.
Physiology
- Anatomy
- A long, flat snout covered in ampullae of Lorenzini, with projectable jaws.
- Respiration
- Gill respiration.
- Vision
- Reduced, of little use in the darkness of the depths.
- Adaptations
- Jaws connected to elastic ligaments, propelled out of the mouth in a fraction of a second.
🔗 Web of marine life
Prey
⚡ Its extraordinary abilities
- Can project its jaws out of its head in a fraction of a second to catch prey
- Detects prey via electrical sensors spread across its long snout
🏆 Records
The fastest jaw-projection attack known in a shark
Jaws thrust out of the head in a fraction of a second.
Source: French National Museum of Natural History
If you cross paths with this animal…
Risk: Low: lives too deep to cross paths with humans, with a few accidental trawl catches.
Behaviour: Poorly documented, very rarely observed.
Advice: Its appearance earned it the nickname "alien shark" in popular culture.
💡 Did you know?
- Considered a living fossil, the sole survivor of a shark lineage 125 million years old.
- Its projectable jaw is said by several biologists to have inspired certain movie-creature effects.
