megamouthn.
/ˈmɛɡəmaʊθ/, U.S. /ˈmɛɡəˌmaʊθ/ In full megamouth shark. A very rare plankton-eating shark, Megachasma pelagios (family Megachasmidae), which has a large, greatly distensible mouth, and has been found in the ocean off Hawaii, California, Japan, and Western Australia. Also (usually as Megamouth): an individual shark of this species.
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the world > animals > fish > subclass Elasmobranchii > order Pleurotremata > [noun] > miscellaneous types of
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megamouth1977
1977 Oceans Nov.–Dec. 46/1 Navy researchers collected the fifteen foot, sixteen-hundred pound male specimen which has come to be called ‘megamouth’ after its distinctive oral cavity.
1983 New Scientist 27 Oct. 266/3 Megamouth had a total of 236 tiny teeth which do not bite or tear but act like a sieve.
1991 Sea Frontiers Feb. 21 This megamouth shark is the first ever seen alive.
1993 L. Taylor Sharks of Hawaii 62 Biologists have speculated that megamouths may attract or concentrate prey animals by emitting a silvery light from the inside of its mouth... The tissue in Megamouth I was too deteriorated to provide evidence, and histological work on Megamouth II was inconclusive.
This is a new entry (OED Third Edition, June 2001; most recently modified version published online March 2022).
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n.1977