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Mechanism of force enhancement during stretching of skeletal muscle fibres investigated by high time-resolved stiffness measurements

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Abstract

Stretching of active muscles leads to a great enhancement of the force developed without increased ATP consumption. The mechanism of force enhancement is still debated and it is not clear if it is due to increased crossbridge strain or to a stretch-induced increase in crossbridge number. The present study, performed on single fibres from tibialis anterior or interosseus muscles of the frog at 5 °C, was aimed at clarifying this point. A striation follower device was used to measure sarcomere length changes. Force was measured during the application of stretches (0.15–3.9 ms duration, 3–7.8 nm per half-sarcomere amplitude) to activated fibres. Small 4 kHz sinusoidal length oscillations, superimposed on the stretches, were used to calculate fibre stiffness with high time resolution. Stiffness increased during the stretch then subsequently decayed, all in parallel with tension. Likewise, during quick releases, stiffness decreased during the release then subsequently recovered in parallel with tension. Comparison of tension and stiffness both during the tetanus rise and also during stretches which doubled tension, imposed on the tetanus rise, indicated that stretch-induced crossbridge recruitment was only about 11 %, suggesting that force enhancement by stretching is mainly due to an increase of individual crossbridge force, whereas crossbridge recruitment plays only a minor role. The accompanying stiffness changes can be explained by non-linearity of myofilament compliance.

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Acknowledgments

This study was supported by the Università di Firenze, Ministero della Ricerca Scientifica (PRIN) and Ente Cassa di Risparmio di Firenze CRF 2010.0256 and CRF 2011.0302.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Dipartimento di Scienze Fisiologiche and Istituto Interuniversitario di Miologia (IIM), Università degli Studi di Firenze, Viale G.B. Morgagni 63, 50134, Florence, Italy

    Marta Nocella, Maria Angela Bagni, Giovanni Cecchi & Barbara Colombini

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  1. Marta Nocella
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  2. Maria Angela Bagni
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  3. Giovanni Cecchi
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  4. Barbara Colombini
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Correspondence to Giovanni Cecchi.

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Nocella, M., Bagni, M.A., Cecchi, G. et al. Mechanism of force enhancement during stretching of skeletal muscle fibres investigated by high time-resolved stiffness measurements. J Muscle Res Cell Motil 34, 71–81 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10974-012-9335-4

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10974-012-9335-4

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