法国雷恩第一大学Romain Vullo团队的研究揭示，白垩纪晚期海洋中存在类蝠鲼浮游食性鲨鱼。相关论文发表在2021年3月19日出版的《科学》杂志上。

研究人员发现了Aquilolamna milarcae，一种从白垩纪晚期墨西哥海洋沉积物中发现的奇特似浮游性鲨鱼。研究人员将Aquilolamna暂归于鲭鲛目，其特征是具有肥大、细长的胸鳍。这种之前未知的动物比鲨鱼和蝠鲼（Mobulidae）早产生3000万年，并揭示鲨鱼可能具有水下飞行进化过程，研究还表明翼状胸鳍在两个远缘相关的进化枝中独立进化。

这种新发现的高度特化的长翅鲨（Aquilolamnidae）具有aquilopelagic样生态型，在中生代晚期海中可能已经占据了由白垩纪-古近纪边界之后水生生物和其他类蝠鲼富含的生态位。

研究人员表示，灭绝板鳃亚纲的生态多样性是未知的。

附：英文原文

Title: Manta-like planktivorous sharks in Late Cretaceous oceans

Author: Romain Vullo, Eberhard Frey, Christina Ifrim, Margarito A. González González, Eva S. Stinnesbeck, Wolfgang Stinnesbeck

Issue&Volume: 2021/03/19

Abstract: The ecomorphological diversity of extinct elasmobranchs is incompletely known. Here, we describe Aquilolamna milarcae, a bizarre probable planktivorous shark from early Late Cretaceous open marine deposits in Mexico. Aquilolamna, tentatively assigned to Lamniformes, is characterized by hypertrophied, slender pectoral fins. This previously unknown body plan represents an unexpected evolutionary experimentation with underwater flight among sharks, more than 30 million years before the rise of manta and devil rays (Mobulidae), and shows that winglike pectoral fins have evolved independently in two distantly related clades of filter-feeding elasmobranchs. This newly described group of highly specialized long-winged sharks (Aquilolamnidae) displays an aquilopelagic-like ecomorphotype and may have occupied, in late Mesozoic seas, the ecological niche filled by mobulids and other batoids after the Cretaceous–Paleogene boundary.

DOI: 10.1126/science.abc1490

Source: https://science.sciencemag.org/content/371/6535/1253