Regulation in the numbers of tentacles of aggregated hydra cells.

Head formation was investigated during regeneration of dissociated and aggregated cells of Hydra magnipapillata. The surface area measured at the hollowing stage was found to be a useful quantity for characterizing the size of an aggregate. Four kinds of aggregates were examined, using tissue originating from (1) whole animals, (2) apical halves, (3) decapitated animals, and (4) decapitated animals allowed to regenerate for several hours before dissociation. For aggregate types (1), (2), and (4), not all the tentacles observed at an intermediate stage of the regeneration process were localized around hypostomes: the number of such body tentacles at the intermediate stage was comparable to that of the hypostomal tentacles and was approximately proportional to the surface area. These results and others suggest that the formation of body tentacles takes place independently of hypostome formation. However, for aggregate type (3), most of the tentacles appearing at the intermediate stage were hypostomal. The correlation between the surface area and the number of tentacles at the steady state apparently resulted from a regulation process by which body tentacles decreased and hypostomal tentacles increased. It is considered that the number of body tentacles appearing at an intermediate stage of regeneration would depend on the initial level of head-activation potential and that body tentacles are formed by the local fluctuation of head-activation potential.