Cover article – Involvement of sulfated biopolymers in adhesive secretions produced by marine invertebrates

On their oral surface, sea stars possess hundreds of small adhesive appendages, the tube feet. These organs allow them to attach strongly but reversibly to rock substrates or to other surfaces in the sea. This so-called temporary adhesion is one of the four types of adhesion encountered in marine organisms, the other being permanent (e.g. in mussels or tubeworms), transitory (e.g. limpets) and instantaneous (e.g. sea cucumbers) adhesion. Patrick Flammang and colleagues investigated the presence of sulfated biopolymers in these five marine invertebrates, representative of the four types of adhesion. 

Featured article  – Long non-coding RNA PICSAR decreases adhesion and promotes migration of squamous carcinoma cells by downregulating α2β1 and α5β1 integrin expression

Liisa Nissinen and colleagues demonstrate that long non-coding RNA PICSAR decreases adhesion and promotes migration of cutaneous squamous cell carcinoma cells by regulating the expression of collagen and fibronectin binding α2β1 and α5β1 integrins.

First Person interviews

Have you seen our interviews with the early-career first authors of our papers? Recently, we caught up with first authors Lata Adnani, Daiana Almeida De Souza, Ying Liu, Jane Khudyakov and Minna Piipponen.

Why should you publish your next paper in BiO?

Biology Open has strong credentials and publishing with us is easy and fast. BiO aims to provide rapid publication for scientifically sound observations and valid conclusions in developmental, cell, experimental and translational biology. Submit your paper here; you’ll be in good company.

Recent experimental biology highlights in BiO – Mark I. McCormick and colleagues show that fish exhibit water flow-induced changes in their fast-start escape performance, likely due to an in situ training effect and/or selection for faster performance phenotypes in areas with high flow speed.

Transfer to Biology Open

If your submission to one of our other journals, Development, Journal of Cell Science, Journal of Experimental Biology or Disease Models & Mechanism, is unsuccessful, did you know you can transfer your paper and any reviews directly to Biology Open? The majority of papers transferred with reviews are accepted for publication. Find out how here.

preLights - The ecological drivers of variation in global language diversity

Lindell Brohman and colleagues show that favorable environmental conditions lead to an increase in the number of distinct languages spoken in a specific geographical area, in their recent preprint. Ashrifia Adomako-Ankomah chose to highlight this article as being of particular interest to the biological community.