Mechanical adaptability of sea cucumber Cuvierian tubules involves a mutable collagenous tissue.

Despite their soft body and slow motion, sea cucumbers present a low predation rate, reflecting the presence of efficient defence systems. For instance, members of the family Holothuriidae rely on Cuvierian tubules for their defence. These tubules are normally stored in the posterior coelomic cavity of the animal, but when the sea cucumber is threatened by a potential predator, they are expelled through the cloacal aperture, elongate, become sticky and entangle and immobilise the predator in a matter of seconds.

Instantaneous adhesion of Cuvierian tubules in the sea cucumber Holothuria forskali.

The peculiar Cuvierian tubules of sea cucumbers function as a defense mechanism. They thwart attacks by creating a sticky network composed of elongated tubules within which the potential predator is entangled in a matter of seconds and thus immobilized. Cuvierian tubules are typical instantaneous adhesive organs in which tissue integrity is destroyed during the release of the adhesive secretion.

Sea star tenacity mediated by a protein that fragments, then aggregates.

Sea stars adhere firmly but temporarily to various substrata as a result of underwater efficient adhesive secretions released by their tube feet. Previous studies showed that this material is mainly made up of proteins, which play a key role in its adhesiveness and cohesiveness. Recently, we solubilized the majority of these proteins and obtained 43 de novo-generated peptide sequences by tandem MS.