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Chondrichthyes

Chondrichthyes

Overview

Class chondrichthyes includes sharks, skates, rays, and chimaeras. Chondrichthyans are predatory jawed vertebrates with a skeleton made of cartilage instead of bone and have been around since the Silurian Period (+430 million years ago). Although skeletons are rarely preserved, shark teeth are plentiful in the fossil record, especially for the Late Cretaceous.


Orders of Chondrichthyes present in the Creteacous of the Western Interior Seaway