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Continuing Education in Anaesthesia, Critical Care & Pain 2006 6(1):1-6; doi:10.1093/bjaceaccp/mki062
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Continuing Education in Anaesthesia, Critical Care & Pain | Volume 6 Number 1 2006 © The Board of Management and Trustees of the British Journal of Anaesthesia [2006]. All rights reserved. For Permissions, please email: journals.permissions@oxfordjournals.org

Skeletal muscle physiology

Philip M Hopkins, Professor of Anaesthesia
Academic Unit of Anaesthesia, University of Leeds, St James's University Hospital, Leeds LS9 7TF, UK
E-mail: p.m.hopkins@leeds.ac.uk (for correspondence)

The first 150 words of the full text of this article appear below.


Key points

Skeletal muscle constitutes 40% of muscle mass. Derangement of muscle function can have profound systemic effects.

Physiological skeletal muscle contraction requires generation and spread of a membrane action potential, transduction of the electrical energy into an intracellular chemical signal that, in turn, triggers myofilament interaction.

Intracellular cytoskeletal proteins, cell membrane structures and the associated glycoprotein extracellular matrix are important for maintenance of cell architecture and force transmission.

Smooth and graded changes in force of contraction are achieved through summation of responses to successive stimuli and recruitment of motor units.

Sustained muscle contraction requires de novo synthesis of ATP, which is principally aerobic or anaerobic depending on muscle fibre type.

 

The skeletal muscles are the effector organs of the locomotor system. They are under voluntary control, although much of their activity is subconsciously regulated. Skeletal muscle and cardiac muscle are both described as striated muscle because of their striped . . . [Full Text of this Article]


   Electrical events in muscle contraction
 

   Excitation-contraction coupling
 

   Contractile structures
 
Force transmission


   Determinants of force of contraction
 
Summation

Recruitment


   Energy for contraction
 

   Muscle fibre-types
 

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