The largest giants of the planet Earth: is there a limit to their size

The longest animal in the world has become a huge siphonophore of the genus Apolemia, whose length exceeds 45 meters, but are there other giants that have not yet been discovered by scientists?

Giants roamed the Earth for a long time and swim in the ocean now, but the limits to their size have not yet been determined. / Photo: Wikipedia

In 2020, researchers first saw what may be the longest animal in history. Each of the sinophores is made up of many smaller animals called zooids.

: Five eyes and a trunk: scientists have found the remains of a creature from a fantasy novel

This is one of several giants discovered by people in recent decades, and lives at a depth of 700 to 1000 meters below the surface, writes Live Science.

But scientists do not always have to descend to such depths to find new colossal creatures.

For example, in 2011, a previously unknown species of whale washed ashore in New Zealand. Giant identified in 2021 as a new member of the beaked whale family.

As for land animals, the remains of the largest unknown monsters are more often dug up here. The main one was a group of sauropod dinosaurs called titanosaurs – giant herbivores with long necks.

Each of them had as much mass of meat as six or seven fully grown male African elephants.

The heaviest and potentially the largest of these was probably the Argentinosaurus – it was 35 meters long and weighed up to 70 tons.

In 2021, scientists announced the discovery of another titanosaurus that could be even bigger.

: An oasis of life was found under a glacier in Antarctica: how is this possible

There should be a limit to how large animals can grow and still support themselves under the weight of gravity, but scientists cannot yet give exact numbers.

We previously wrote:

Source: Segodnya

Share this article:

Leave a Reply

most popular