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<\/p>\n‘Jaws’ is often credited as an inspiration for generations of marine biologists fascinated by sharks. The movie returns to theaters Labor Day weekend.<\/p>\n
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Researchers aboard OceanX vessel capture oceanic whitetip shark courtship<\/p>\n
Scientists aboard OceanX Alucia research vessel capture video of oceanic whitetip shark courtship<\/p>\n
OceanX<\/p>\n
To close out a summer of celebration around the 50th anniversary of the iconic “Jaws,” the movie returns to theaters on Labor Day weekend.<\/a> Its tale of how a great white shark terrorized a beach community led box offices for weeks in the summer of 1975.<\/p>\n The first-ever summer blockbuster<\/a>, it became a cultural phenomenon. It’s also widely credited with inspiring generations of shark scientists who revolutionized what we know about sharks, and they continue to uncover new information about these once mysterious and misunderstood creatures.<\/p>\n “It\u2019s rare that you meet somebody that got involved in shark biology who was not inspired by the movie. It doesn\u2019t matter what age or generation,\u201d\u00a0said John Mandelman, chief scientist and vice president<\/a> of the New England Aquarium\u2019s Anderson Cabot Center for Ocean Life.<\/p>\n Even though sometimes maligned for heightening fears about one of the ocean’s mightiest predators, “the ‘Jaws’ phenomenon has been far more positive for the outlook on sharks in the grand scheme,\u201d Mandelman said. \u201cIt did elevate their plight and inspire many people, myself included, to get into this field.”<\/p>\n While sharks often surface in summer conversations given the hordes who visit the beach and the Discovery Channel’s annual Shark Week, they’re not just a seasonal phenomenon for shark biologists. They fuel a year-round passion among researchers who are sometimes mystified others don’t feel the same way.<\/p>\n \u201cIf someone said there was a velociraptor in Tennessee, thousands of people would come from all over the world,\u201d said Gavin Naylor, a geneticist and professor who studies sharks at the University of Florida. \u201cWe\u2019ve got animals in the ocean that are much older than velociraptors and we see them every day. \u201cThey\u2019re so ancient and old they\u2019ve been around since before there were flowering plants.”\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n “If you\u2019re curious and attentive, the more you look, the more interesting they are,\u201d said Naylor, director of the Florida Program for Shark Research at UF’s Florida Museum of Natural History. \u201cIt\u2019s kind of frustrating that 90% of the world thinks they\u2019re dangerous and less than .001% of the world thinks they\u2019re really, really cool and that\u2019s the nerds.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n New shark facts discovered all the time<\/p>\n When the movie was released in 1975, there were a lot of unanswered questions about sharks. Sharks are hard to study, Naylor said. \u201cIt\u2019s hard to find them. They\u2019re particularly large, and you have to take steps not to get injured.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n But there have been huge advances in the five decades since moviegoers first heard Roy Scheider utter the ad-libbed: “You’re gonna need a bigger boat.”<\/a><\/p>\n New things are being discovered all the time, such as new species, as well as information about their genetics and reproduction<\/a> and their migration patterns.<\/p>\n