ABOVE: The solitary tunicate Polycarpa mytiligera (center) growing on a yellow coral
TAL ZAQUIN
Ascidians, marine invertebrates more commonly known as tunicates or sea squirts, come in two flavors: solitary or colonial. Colonial species are known for their extensive ability to rebuild damaged tissue and even generate entirely new individuals through budding, while solitary species have long been thought to be much more limited in what they can regrow. A study published April 15 in Frontiers in Cell and Developmental Biology has documented for the first time the ability of a solitary tunicate to generate as many as three new individuals in response to amputation.
Tal Gordon, a marine biologist at Tel Aviv University in Israel who completed this work as part of her dissertation (she’s now a postdoc at the same institution), has been studying the tunicate Polycarpa mytiligera since her undergraduate research, and it was during that time when ...
