SZULGIT, G.K.*; WNUK, J.A.; Hiram College; Hiram College: Evidence that mechanically effective agents in the mutable collagenous tissues of the family Cucumariidae are somewhat conserved

Echinoderms such as sea cucumbers can rapidly and reversibly alter the stiffness of their connective tissues (also known as mutable collagenous tissues) in response to a number of stimuli (some physiologically plausible and some not). In the late 1990�s, it was discovered that two distinct extract solutions could be made from the inner and outer regions of the body wall of the sea cucumber Cucumaria frondosa, and that these had either a stiffening or a softening effect on tissues of the same species (Koob-Edmunds, et al., 1997). In the current study, we show the first example of these same extract solutions affecting tissues of another species (Oncus pygmaeus previously referred to as Pentacta pymaea). This suggests that the chemical mechanisms causing stiffness changes in tissue stiffness are somewhat conserved at the Family level in the case of Cucumariidae. Future work will determine whether or not this phenomenon is true in other families and at higher taxonomic levels.