Cetorhinus maximus
(Gunnerus, 1765) · speciesAt a glance
Sources16 archives
Databases and archives Cetorhinus maximus's data was compiled from.
WikipediaWikimedia Foundation18 languages↗
Animal Diversity WebUniv. of Michigan MZspecies account↗
BioWikiNetmultilingual Wikipediamultilingual↗
GBIFGlobal Biodiversity Information Facility40 676 records↗
OBISOcean Biodiversity Information System42 808 records↗
ENAEuropean Nucleotide Archive · EMBL-EBI3 411 eDNA detections↗
BOLD SystemsCentre for Biodiversity Genomics102 specimens↗
LOTUSNatural Products (Wikidata)compounds↗
NPASSNat. Product Activity & Species Sourcecompounds↗
Open Tree of LifeOpenTreephylogeny backbone↗
GoaTGenomes on a Tree · Sangergenome & karyotype↗
NCBIUS National Library of Medicinegenome & karyotype↗
Paleobiology DatabasePBDB consortiumfossil record↗
WikidataWikimedia Foundationstructured facts↗
Catalogue of LifeCOLtaxonomy↗
GLoBIGlobal Biotic Interactionsbiotic interactions↗Every layer below draws on the sources above — open one to explore it, or use ← → to move between tabs.
The basking shark (Cetorhinus maximus) is the second-largest living shark and fish, after the whale shark, and one of three plankton-eating shark species, along with the whale shark and megamouth shark. Adults typically reach 7.9 m in length. It is usually greyish-brown, with mottled skin. The caudal fin has a strong lateral keel and a crescent shape. Other common names include bone shark, elephant shark, sail-fish, and sun-fish. In Orkney, it is commonly known as hoe-mother (sometimes contracted to homer), meaning "the mother of the pickled dog-fish".Yarrell, William. (1836). A History of British Fishes. Volume II. John Van Voorst, London. p. 397. The basking shark is a cosmopolitan migratory species, found in all the world's temperate oceans. A slow-moving filter feeder, its common name derives from its habit of feeding at the surface, appearing to be basking in the warmer water there. It has anatomical adaptations for filter-feeding, such as a greatly enlarged mouth and highly developed gill rakers. Its snout is conical and the gill slits extend around the top and bottom of its head. The gill rakers, dark and bristle-like, are used to catch plankton as water filters through the mouth and over the gills. The teeth are numerous and very small, and often number 100 per row. The teeth have a single conical cusp, are curved backwards and are the same on both the upper and lower jaws. This species has the smallest weight-for-weight brain size of any shark, reflecting its relatively passive lifestyle. Basking sharks have been shown from satellite tracking to overwinter in both continental shelf (less than 200 m) and deeper waters. They may be found in either small shoals or alone. Despite their large size and threatening appearance, basking sharks are not aggressive and are harmless to humans. The basking shark has long been a commercially important fish as a source of food, shark fin, animal feed, and shark liver oil. Overexploitation has reduced its populations to the point where some have disappeared and others need protection.
No narrative description available for this taxon yet.
Size & morphology2
Life cycle & reproduction3
Habitat & environment2
Uses & economy1
Other traits3
Compounds documented for Cetorhinus maximus across natural-product and food-composition databases — not just the ~150 nutrients on a classic label ("nutritional dark matter").
Compound class profile5 classes
Documented compounds22 total
| Compound | Class | Amount | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| (R)-6-(1,1-Dimethyl-allyl)-2-(1-hydroxy-1-methyl-ethyl)-2,3-dihydro-furo[3,2-g]chromen-7-one | present | NPASS | |
| 3-(1,1-Dimethyl-2-propen-1-yl)-6,7-dimethoxy-2H-1-benzopyran-2-one | present | NPASS | |
| [D-Glu(OCH2CH(CH3)OH)6]MC-LR | present | LOTUS | |
| [seco-1/2]MC-FR | present | LOTUS | |
| [seco-1/2]MC-HilR | present | LOTUS | |
| beta-Sitosterol | present | NPASS | |
| Gamma-Fagarine | present | NPASS | |
| GXNOBSWJKBHASE-MRXNPFEDSA-N | present | NPASS | |
| HUIORUKWHAETHC-UHFFFAOYSA-N | present | NPASS | |
| Isobauerenol | present | NPASS |
A DNA barcode is a short, standardised stretch of genes that works like a fingerprint — enough to tell one species from another. Below is the molecular trace Cetorhinus maximus has left across the world's sequence archives.
At a glance
★ the standard DNA barcode for this group — the short region actually read to tell this species apart. The rest are extra genes sequenced along the way.
Besides the big genome in the nucleus, cells carry a small, circular loop of DNA inside the cell's energy factories — the mitochondria. It is inherited almost only from the mother and is a leftover from ancient bacteria that moved into the cell. The mitochondrial markers above (ND*, COX, CYTB…) are read from exactly this loop. Outer ring = one strand, inner ring = the other.
The complete instruction manual Cetorhinus maximus carries — its genome. We read it from three angles — how big it is, how the DNA is packed into chromosomes, and how completely it has been sequenced — and explain how to read each value as you go.
Genome sizehow big the whole instruction manual is
Measured in base pairs (bp) — the individual letters of DNA (human ≈ 3.2 Gb, a bacterium a few million). The chart places this genome on a logarithmic scale — each step to the right is ten times bigger — among reference organisms. Across species a bigger genome loosely tracks with larger cells, slower growth and lower-energy lifestyles (powered flight favours small genomes) — yet it does not imply more genes or a more advanced organism (the long-standing C-value paradox).
Sequencing statusassembly quality — how far to trust these numbers
Assembly level tells you how finished the sequence is — from fragmented contigs, through scaffolds, up to a full chromosome-level assembly. BUSCO % estimates completeness: the share of genes expected to be present that were actually found. These describe the data quality, not the organism.
How far back this lineage goes — and how we know. Everything here is measured in Ma, short for “mega-annum”: millions of years ago. The chart reads left to right like a calendar of the Earth, from the deep past on the left to today at the right edgetop to bottom like a core drilled through the Earth, from the deep past at the top down to today at the bottom.
At a glance
When this lineage existed
How to read this: the coloured strip along the bottomdown the left is the geological calendar — the standard epochs (Pliocene, Pleistocene…) every museum uses, shown so you can see which chapter of Earth's history this lineage lived in. This lineage is a young one, so the strip is zoomed in to epochs — the finer subdivisions inside a period. The solid bar is the fossil range: the span between the oldest and the youngest fossil that palaeontologists have assigned to Cetorhinus maximus. Above itBeside it, each dot is one dated fossil find — few enough to count, so they are drawn individually rather than as a graph.
How it livedPBDB
Record type83 515 records
Origin
Range
Depth
Wildobservation + sensor
Human sightings and records, or camera-trap / sensor detections — someone (or a device) saw or captured the species in the wild.
Museum / Voucheredphysical evidence
Backed by a physical specimen — a herbarium sheet, sample or voucher held in a collection. “Vouchered” means supported by material evidence, not just an observation.
Wildobservation + sensor
Human sightings and records, or camera-trap / sensor detections — someone (or a device) saw or captured the species in the wild.
Holding institutions12 of 30 geolocated
Institutions and collections holding physical, vouchered specimens of this species — click a row to fly to it on the map.
| Institution | Specimens |
|---|---|
| Museums Victorialocation not on record | 22 |
| DASSHlocation not on record | 14 |
| North Carolina Museum of Natural Scienceslocation not on record | 8 |
| CASlocation not on record | 7 |
| Los Angeles, US | 7 |
| Cambridge, US | 6 |
| Washington, US | 5 |
| Paris, FR | 4 |
| Sydney, AU | 4 |
| University of California San Diegolocation not on record | 4 |
| DOI/NPS, Salem Maritime National Historic Sitelocation not on record | 3 |
| Museo civico La Terra e l'Uomo di Crocetta del Montellolocation not on record | 3 |
| New Haven, US | 3 |
| Toronto, CA | 2 |
| University of California Los Angeleslocation not on record | 2 |
| Florida Museum of Natural History- Zoology, Paleontology & Paleobotanylocation not on record | 2 |
| NTNU-VMlocation not on record | 2 |
| Natural History Museum Rotterdamlocation not on record | 2 |
| FishBaselocation not on record | 2 |
| Tromsø, NO | 2 |
| The Atlantic reference Centrelocation not on record | 1 |
| Universidad Católica del Nortelocation not on record | 1 |
| Stockholm, SE | 1 |
| National Marine Biodiversity Institute of Korealocation not on record | 1 |
| South Kensington, GB | 1 |
| Western Australian Museumlocation not on record | 1 |
| Frankfurt am Main | 1 |
| Agenzia Regionale per la Protezione Ambientale della Toscanalocation not on record | 1 |
| National Natural History Collectionslocation not on record | 1 |
| Citadel Hill, GB | 1 |
Where the DNA of Cetorhinus maximus was picked up in samples of water, soil or air — nobody saw the organism, only its DNA left behind. A trace is a clue that the species was near, not a confirmed sighting.
Signal
Where its DNA was found
How strong is each trace?
Modelled climatemodelled
How to read this: each dot is one detection of this species' DNA in an environmental sample. The confidence meter weighs how many independent studies and places back up the signal — one detection in one study is a hint; many across several studies is solid. Records dated before 2008 (when eDNA methods began) are treated as likely mislabeled and left off the map.