Charlie Underwood

Charlie Underwood

London

Department of Earth and Planetary Science , Birkbeck College

Dr.

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Haven't backed any projects yet! 

Published on Nov 30, 2016

Squaliform tooth paper

Dear All,We have just had an open access paper on the tooth development of squaliform sharks come out, and i hope you find it interesting; if nothing else the photos are goodhttp://rsos.royalsociet...

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Published on Nov 10, 2016

And for those who like their sharks flat.....

I also got a few specimens of skates. This is a mature male (with huge claspers) of Amblyraja radiata- possibly the commonest skate in the cool waters of the North Atlantic. We have...

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Published on Nov 10, 2016

The oddities at the bottom of the sea

As well as heads of the five known UK species of the deepwater catshark Apristurus, there were 2 whole specimen that did not really well match any of them. Are they simply extreme f...

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Published on Nov 10, 2016

Unpacking my presents

I have now been up to Aberdeen and brought back the specimens that Francis Neat so kindle collected. I had to explain to the lady in the airport that the box going through the X-Ray...

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Published on Sep 17, 2016

What I have been up to (2)

As well as looking at modern sharks I have been looking at some important fossils. This is a fantastic fossil of an early ray from the Late Jurassic of southern England. This incidentally is part o...

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Published on Sep 17, 2016

What I have been up to (1)

No updates for a while I am afraid, but I have not been completely idle. The Scotia is currently cruising the cold grey seas north of Scotland and will hopefully catch the chimaeras needed for this...

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Published on Jul 14, 2016

A fishy thank you to everyone

It looks as if we have reached the target and i with to offer by fullest thanks to everyone who has helped out. Chimaeras are not the prettiest of fish i grant you, and my lab freezer will never sm...

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Published on Jul 13, 2016

Wot no fish?

Sorry for not being able to do any updates here for a while. I have been in Montenegro supervising some student projects, and did not even get a chance to get to the fish market whilst I was there....

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Published on Jun 28, 2016

More deep sea sharks

The deep water trawls that have produced the chimaeras also brought up some other deep water goodies. Here is a couple of heads of a very poorly known deepsea shark, Apristurus melanoasper. These l...

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Reply to:Gavin NaylorGavin Naylor
Apparently H. pallidus gets larger but they didn't get any this time. I got samples of most of the NE Atlantic species. If you want tissue samples let me know.
That lump of slime and oil is over 2 kilos!
This one is now skeletonise (and is coming to the IoW this weekend. I have some smaller ones of other species and could fix one.
Reply to:Matt KolmannMatt Kolmann
And the squalene oil was so nice to my hands...
I am fixing them so will try to CT scan one; species are identified on such characters as numbers of vertebrae and spiral valves in the gut.
Reply to:Matt KolmannMatt Kolmann
I have not noticed it; the fleshy electro related tissue seems to be around the head and presumably only sensory in skates. But if no one has looked....
Reply to:Cindy WuCindy Wu
No idea. Do any male skates fight for mates like this? Both with tails missing are mature males, the 2 mature males are undamaged. There are also a range of small squaliform sharks there with cutting teeth. Maybe a hit and run attack by an Etmopterus?