MHC-based fiber type and E-C coupling characteristics in mechanically skinned muscle fibers of the rat.
Goodman, Craig, Michael Patterson, and Gabriela Stephenson.
1Muscle Cell Biochemistry Laboratory, School of Biomedical Sciences, Victoria University, Melbourne City, Melbourne 8001; and 2School of Zoology, Faculty of Science and Technology, La Trobe University, Bundoora, Victoria 3083, Australia
APStracts 10:0061C, 2003.
In this study, we investigated whether the previously established differences between fast- and slow-twitch single skeletal muscle fibers of the rat, in terms of myosin heavy chain (MHC) isoform composition and contractile function, are also detectable in excitation-contraction (E-C) coupling. We compared the contractile responsiveness of electrophoretically typed, mechanically skinned single fibers from the soleus (Sol), the extensor digitorum longus (EDL), and the white region of the sternomastoid (SM) muscle to t-system depolarization-induced activation. The quantitative parameters assessed were the amplitude of the maximum depolarization-induced force response (DIFRmax; normalized to the maximum Ca2+-activated force in that fiber) and the number of responses elicited until the force declined by 75% of DIFRmax (R-D75%). The mean DIFRmax values for type IIB EDL and type IIB SM fibers were not statistically different, and both were greater than the mean DIFRmax for type I Sol fibers. The mean R-D75% for type IIB EDL fibers was greater than that for type I Sol fibers as well as type IIB SM fibers. These data suggest that E-C coupling characteristics of mechanically skinned rat single muscle fibers are related to MHC-based fiber type and the muscle of origin.
Received 6 December 2002; accepted in final form 25 January 2003
APS Manuscript Number C569-2.
Article publication pending Am J Physiol Cell Physiol
ISSN 1080-4757 Copyright 2003 The American Physiological Society.
Published in APStracts on 25 March 2003