The Eastern Pacific black ghostshark (''Hydrolagus melanophasma'', literally a combination of "water rabbit" and "black ghost") is a species of fish in the family

Chimaeridae The Chimaeridae, or short-nosed chimaeras, are a family of cartilaginous fish. They resemble other chimaeras in general form and habits, but have short, rounded snouts, without the modifications found in related families. Many species have lon ...

.Carlos Bustamante, Hernán Flores, Yhon Concha-Pérez, Carolina Vargas-Caro, Julio Lamilla & Mike Bennett
''First record of Hydrolagus melanophasma James, Ebert, Long & Didier, 2009 (Chondrichthyes, Chimaeriformes, Holocephali) from the southeastern Pacific Ocean''
Lat. Am. J. Aquat. Res. vol.40 no.1 Valparaíso Mar. 2012 Despite its name, it does not belong to the

clade A clade (), also known as a monophyletic group or natural group, is a group of organisms that are monophyletic – that is, composed of a common ancestor and all its lineal descendants – on a phylogenetic tree. Rather than the English term, ...

Selachii Sharks are a group of elasmobranch fish characterized by a cartilaginous skeleton, five to seven gill slits on the sides of the head, and pectoral fins that are not fused to the head. Modern sharks are classified within the clade Selachimorp ...

used for the modern classification of sharks. It is, however, distantly related to the sharks in the sense that both are Chondrichthyes (cartilaginous fishes).

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Greg Laden Gregory Thomas Laden is an American biological anthropologist and science blogger. Education Born in 1958, Laden received his B.A. from the University of the State of New York's Regents College program in 1984, and his M.A. and Ph.D. from Harvard ...

''The Eastern Pacific Black Ghost Shark''
on smithsonian.com, 2009-9-28 (contains a short video of the fish) *Christine Dell'Amore

National Geographic News, 2009-9-22 *http://www.fishbase.se/summary/Hydrolagus-melanophasma.html {{DEFAULTSORT:ghostshark, black, eastern Pacific Eastern Pacific black ghostshark Western American coastal fauna Eastern Pacific black ghostshark