Fig. 3: Structural analyses of growing silica inside the SDV.

A The changes in normalized volumes of the two phases inside the SDV, the dense silica (green) and the luminal silica-free solution surrounding it (purple). Seven datasets for the SDV center and seven for its periphery were analyzed and ordered according to their developmental stage (A detailed legend is present in Supplementary Figs. S2, S3). Silica volume increases with the maturation stage (linear regression p = 0.000187*** for the center and p = 0.00388** for the periphery). The slope of the silica-free volume linear regression is not significantly different from zero (linear regression p = 0.159021 for the center and p = 0.2528 for the periphery). The last maturation stage of the silica-free volume in the SDV center was omitted from the calculation (see also Supplementary Table S1 and Supplementary Fig. S6). Source data are provided as a Source Data file. B A cryoET slice from Stage II in Fig. 2, with insets showing higher magnifications of two regions with different silica textures (see also Supplementary Fig. S5), this dataset is representative of 34 collected tomograms containing an SDV.