ArticleProceedings. Biological sciences2017
Physical trade-offs shape the evolution of buoyancy control in sharks.
Article in Proceedings. Biological sciences, 2017. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 15 papers.
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Who cites it
15 citing papers in PubMed, 49 citations in OpenAlex.
- Greenland sharks conform to expectations of neutral buoyancy but exhibit inter-individual variation.The Journal of experimental biology · 2026Article
- Convergent reduction in skeletal density during benthic to pelagic transitions in Baikal sculpins.bioRxiv : the preprint server for biology · 2026Article
- Parallel Reduction in Skeletal Density During Benthic to Pelagic Transitions in Baikal Sculpins.Integrative organismal biology (Oxford, England) · 2026Article
- Insights Into the Ecomorphology of the Blue Shark (Ecology and evolution · 2025Article
- Refining Electronic Tagging of Marine Animals: Computational Fluid Dynamics and Pelagic Sharks.Animals : an open access journal from MDPI · 2025Article
- Reassessment of the possible size, form, weight, cruising speed, and growth parameters of the extinct megatooth shark,Palaeontologia electronica (Online) · 2025Article
- Allometric Growth and Scaling of Body Form of the Spadenose Shark (Ecology and evolution · 2024Article
- The hydrodynamics of jet propulsion swimming in hatchling and juvenile European common cuttlefish, Sepia officinalis.The Journal of experimental biology · 2023Article
- Using quantile regression and relative entropy to assess the period of anomalous behavior of marine mammals following tagging.Ecology and evolution · 2023Article
- Buoyancy and hydrostatic balance in a West Indian Ocean coelacanth Latimeria chalumnae.BMC biology · 2022Article
- The extinct sharkScience advances · 2022Article
- Squalene: More than a Step toward Sterols.Antioxidants (Basel, Switzerland) · 2020Review
- Depth-dependent dive kinematics suggest cost-efficient foraging strategies by tiger sharks.Royal Society open science · 2020Article
- Article
- Mineralization of theFrontiers in genetics · 2020Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
3 authors at 3 institutions in 2 countries.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Buoyancy control is a fundamental aspect of aquatic life that has major implications for locomotor performance and ecological niche. Unlike terrestrial animals, the densities of aquatic animals are similar to the supporting fluid, thus even small changes in body density may have profound effects on locomotion. Here, we analysed the body composition (lipid versus lean tissue) of 32 shark species to study the evolution of buoyancy. Our comparative phylogenetic analyses indicate that although lean tissue displays minor positive allometry, liver volume exhibits pronounced positive allometry, suggesting that larger sharks evolved bulkier body compositions by adding lipid tissue to lean tissue rather than substituting lean for lipid tissue, particularly in the liver. We revealed a continuum of buoyancy control strategies that ranged from more buoyant sharks with larger livers in deeper ecosystems to relatively denser sharks with small livers in epipelagic habitats. Across this eco-morphological spectrum, our hydrodynamic modelling suggests that neutral buoyancy yields lower drag and more efficient steady swimming, whereas negative buoyancy may be more efficient during accelerated movements. The evolution of buoyancy control in sharks suggests that ecological and physiological factors mediate the selective pressures acting on these traits along two major gradients, body size and habitat depth.
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