Ectoderm Mouth Opening

To open its mouth, Hydra must tear a hole in its epithelium. This movie shows mouth opening and closing in an animal with a GFP-tagged ectodermal epithelial layer. As GFP is concentrated around the perimeter of the cell and in the nucleus, individual cells with their respective nuclei are easily identifiable. Mouth opening is accompanied by dramatic cell deformations but no cell rearrangements. Movie is recorded at 2.2 fps and played at 10 fps. Scale bar is 200 µm. See the paper by Carter et al. in the March 8 issue of Biophysical Journal. Read more at