The Monterey Bay Aquarium placed a young female great white shark (Carcharodon carcharias) on display in captivity after it had been accidentally captured in a commercial halibut gillnet off the coast of southern California in September 2004.

After several months in captivity, the shark became increasingly agressive. The shark attacked and killed two soupfin sharks that shared its tank. Resesarchers believe the attacks signaled the tank was too small. The constrained living area increased the likelihood of agression as it greatly reduced the shark's natural roaming space and territory. In March 2005, aquarium researchers decided it was time to return the shark to the wild.

Before releasing the shark back into the wild, aquarium scientists fitted her with tagging instrumentation that would measure the shark's location and dive depths, as well as surrounding water temperatures. After a period of 30 days, the device would release itself and float to the surface where it would trasmit data to a satellite. That transmitted data is now available at the Monterey Bay Aquarium.

The Monterey Bay Aquarim has a slideshow of the great white shark's story as well as a movie of the shark's journey to the aquarium.

The aquarium also performs a range of other research projects that focus on finding out more about great white sharks.