Fig. 2

Sea star bipinnaria regeneration involves wound healing, re-proportioning, and respecification.(a) DIC images showing larval recovery following bisection (top row) and magnifications of the wound site at each stage (bottom row). Important anatomical features are highlighted in the magnified images including the wound site (arrowheads), opening to the gut lumen (dotted lines), and new ciliary bands (asterisks). Scale bar = 100 μm; applicable to all images in panel. (b) Two serial sections from the same individual showing wound closure (arrowheads) and many free cells within the blastocoelar space (asterisks). (c) Ratios of length from the posterior pole to the top of the post-oral ciliary band to length from the posterior pole to the anterior pole (i.e., total length of the specimen) are plotted along with the difference of the means (i.e., Δ length ratio) and 95% confidence interval. Those timepoints with a ratio found to be significantly different than uncut larvae are indicated by the red line and asterisk (Mann-Whitney U test, p value < 0.001). n = number of individuals measured at each timepoint