The new technique allows scientists to say with a degree of certainty whether the beast was a 14-foot tiger shark or a 9-foot bull shark, said George Burgess, director of the International Shark Attack File, which is housed at UF's Florida Museum of Natural History.

The ability to make predictions from bite patterns is important to understanding the behavioral underpinnings of shark attacks and their prey habits, said lead researcher Dayv Lowry, a biologist with the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife, who did the work as a graduate student at the University of South Florida.

The new technique was developed in collaboration with researchers from the University of South Florida. The research appears in the November issue of the journal Marine Biology.

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