Motor Unit

Definition:
A motor unit is made up of a motor neuron and the skeletal muscle fibers innervated by
that motor neuron's axonal terminals.
Groups of motor units often work together to coordinate the contractions of a single
muscle; all of the motor units within a muscle are considered a motor pool
The concept was proposed by Charles Scott Sherrington

A. Structure of Motor Unit

1. A motor unit consists of one motor neuron and all the muscle fibers it innervates. The
term muscle unit has been introduced to refer to the group of muscle fibers innervated
by a given motor neuron
2. The number of muscle fibers within a motor unit varies, and is a function of the
muscle’s ability for accurate and refined motion.
3. Precision is inversely proportional to the size of the motor unit.
4. Small motor units can exercise greater precision of movement compared to larger
motor units.
5. Thigh muscles, responsible for large powerful movements, can have a thousand
fibers in each unit,
6. Eye muscles, requiring small precise movements, might only have ten fibers in each
unit
7. Groups of motor units are innervated to coordinate contraction of a whole muscle and
generate appropriate movement
8. All of the motor units within a muscle are considered a motor pool.
9. Motor Pool: A collection of motor units.
10. Motor Unit: A grouping of a motor neuron and the muscle fibers innervated by it.

Motor Neurons:
Motor neurons are the only central neurons with axons that leave the central nervous
system (CNS) to innervate no neuronal tissue. Their cell bodies are located in the anterior
horn of the gray matter of the spinal cord.
The motor neurons that innervate the same muscle cluster together in motor nuclei that
form elongated columns that generally extend over several spinal cord segments
 B. Function of Motor Unit
All muscle fibers in a motor unit are of the same fiber type. When a motor unit is
activated, all of its fibers contract. In vertebrates, the force of a muscle contraction is
controlled by the number of activated motor units.
Recruitment
The central nervous system is responsible for the orderly recruitment of motor neurons,
beginning with the smallest motor units.
Two distinct ways of controlling the force produced by a muscle through motor unit
recruitment: spatial recruitment and temporal recruitment.
a) Spatial recruitment: (Motor unit recruitment)
This is the activation of more motor units to produce a greater force. Larger motor units
contract along with small motor units until all muscle fibers in a single muscle are
activated, thus producing the maximum muscle force.
 Motor unit recruitment refers to the activation of additional motor units to
accomplish an increase in contractile strength in a muscle.
 When a motor neuron is activated, all of the muscle fibers innervated by the motor
neuron are stimulated and contract.
 The activation of one motor neuron will result in a weak but distributed muscle
contraction.
 The activation of more motor neurons will result in more muscle fibers being
activated, and therefore a stronger muscle contraction.
 Motor unit recruitment is a measure of how many motor neurons are activated in a
particular muscle, and therefore is a measure of how many muscle fibers of that
muscle are activated.
 The higher the recruitment the stronger the muscle contraction will be. Motor units
are generally recruited in order of smallest to largest (smallest motor neurons to
largest motor neurons, and thus slow to fast twitch) as contraction increases. This
is known as Henneman's size principle.
Neuronal mechanism of recruitment
Henneman proposed that the mechanism underlying the Size Principle was that the
smaller motor neurons had a smaller surface area and therefore a higher membrane
resistance.
 b) Temporal Motor Unit Recruitment: (Rate coding of muscle force)
Rate coding, deals with the frequency of activation of muscle fiber contractions.
Consecutive stimulation on the motor unit fibers from the alpha motor neuron causes the
muscle to twitch more frequently until the twitches "fuse" temporally. This produces a
greater force than singular contractions by decreasing the interval between stimulations to
produce a larger force with the same number of motor units.
 The force produced by a single motor unit is determined in part by the number
of muscle fibers in the unit. Another important determinant of force is the
frequency with which the muscle fibers are stimulated by their innervating
axon.
 The rate at which the nerve impulses arrive is known as the motor unit firing
rate and may vary from frequencies low enough to produce a series of single
twitch contractions to frequencies high enough to produce a fused tetanic
contraction.
Proportional control of muscle force
 The distribution of motor unit size is such that there is an inverse relationship
between the number of motor units and the force each generates (i.e., the
number of muscle fibers per motor unit).
 There are many small motor units and progressively fewer larger motor units.
This means that at low levels of recruitment, the force increment due to
recruitment is small,
 In forceful contractions, the force increment becomes much larger. Thus the
ratio between the force increment produced by adding another motor unit and
the force threshold at which that unit is recruited remains relatively constant.

Motor Unit Types

Motor units are generally categorized based upon the similarities between several factors:
Physiological Type:
1. FF — Fast fatigable — high force, fast contraction speed but fatigue in a few
seconds.
 2. FR — Fast fatigue resistant — intermediate force, fatigue resistant — fast
contraction speed and resistant to fatigue.

3. FI — Fast intermediate — intermediate between FF and FR.

4. S — Slow — low force, slower contraction speed, highly fatigue resistant.

Histochemical Type:
(The oldest form of biochemical fiber typing)
1. I (Slow oxidative, SO) — Low glycolytic and high oxidative presence. Low(er)
myosin ATPase, sensitive to alkali.
2. IIa (Fast oxidative/glycolytic, FOG) — High glycolytic, oxidative and myosin
ATPase presence, sensitive to acid.
3. IIb (Fast glycolytic, FG) — High glycolytic and myosin ATPase presence,
sensitive to acid. Low oxidative presence.
4. IIi — fibers intermediate between IIa and IIb.
Immuno-histochemical Type:
(A more recent form of fiber typing)
1. Myosin Heavy Chain (MHC)
2. Myosin Light Chain — alkali (MLC1)
3. Myosin Light Chain — regulatory (MLC2)
Electromyography (EMG)
 Using EMG the neural strategies of muscle activation can be measured. Ramp-
force threshold refers to an index of motor neuron size in order to test the size
principle.
 This is tested by determining the recruitment threshold of a motor unit during
isometric contraction in which the force is gradually increased. Motor units
recruited at low force (low-threshold units) tend to be small motor units, while
high-threshold units are recruited when higher forces are needed and involve
larger motor neurons
 To test motor unit stimulation, electrodes are placed extracellularly on the skin and
an intramuscular stimulation is applied. After the motor unit is stimulated, its pulse
is then recorded by the electrode and displayed as an action potential, known as a
motor unit action potential (MUAP). When multiple MUAP’s are recorded within
a short time interval, a motor unit action potential train (MUAPT) is then noted.
 EMG:

Electrodiagnostic Testing (EDX)

In medical electro-diagnostic testing for a patient with weakness, careful analysis of the
"motor unit action potential" (MUAP) size, shape, and recruitment pattern can help in
distinguishing a myopathy from a neuropathy.

THE END