远古深海巨兽：真实存在的克拉肯可能统治过古代海洋

he kraken — a gigantic, tentacled sea monster capable of sinking ships — is a creature of Norwegian myth. But millions of years ago, a similar real-life animal lurked in the deep. Fossilized jaws reveal that enormous octopuses possibly up to 19 meters long were top predators in the oceans during an era when dinosaurs ruled on land. These supersize cephalopods may have been the largest marine animals of the Cretaceous Period and may be the biggest invertebrates to ever live, researchers report in Science. Ancient octopuses are difficult to study because their soft bodies often decompose before fossilization, says paleontologist Yasuhiro Iba of Hokkaido University in Sapporo, Japan. …