MUSCLES-STRUCTURE AND

FUNCTION

FUNCTIONS AND PROPERTIES OF

MUSCLE TISSUE
Functions of muscle tissue
1. Movement: Our body's skeleton gives enough rigidity to our body
that skeletal muscles can yank and pull on it, resulting in body movements
such as walking, chewing, running, lifting, manipulating objects with our
hands, and picking our noses.
2. Maintenance of posture: Without much conscious control, our muscles
generate a constant contractile force that allows us to maintain an erect or
seated position, or posture.
3. Respiration: Our muscular system automatically drives movement of air
into and out of our body.
4. Heat generation: Contraction of muscle tissue generates heat, which is
essential for maintenance of temperature homeostasis. For instance, if our
core body temperature falls, we shiver to generate more heat.
5. Communication: Muscle tissue allows us to talk, gesture, write, and convey
our emotional state by doing such things as smiling or frowning.
6. Constriction of organs and blood vessels: Nutrients move through our
digestive tract, urine is passed out of the body, and secretions are propelled
out of glands by contraction of smooth muscle. Constriction or relaxation of
blood vessels regulates blood pressure and blood distribution throughout the
body.
7. Pumping blood: Blood moves through the blood vessels because our heart
tirelessly receives blood and delivers it to all body tissues and organs.
8. This isn't a complete list. Among the many possible examples are the facts
that muscles help protect fragile internal organs by enclosing them, and are
also critical in maintaining the integrity of body cavities. For example,
fetuses with incompletely formed diaphragms have abdominal contents
herniate (protrude) up into the thoracic cavity, which inhibits normal lung
growth and development. Even though this is an incomplete list, an
appreciation of some of these basic muscle functions will help you as we
proceed.
 Properties of muscle tissue

All muscle cells share several properties: contractility, excitability,

extensibility, and elasticity:
1. Contractility is the ability of muscle cells to forcefully shorten. For instance,
in order to flex (decrease the angle of a joint) your elbow you need
to contract (shorten) the biceps brachii and other elbow flexor muscles in
the anterior arm. Notice that in order to extend your elbow, the posterior
arm extensor muscles need to contract. Thus, muscles can only pull, never
push.
2. Excitability is the ability to respond to a stimulus, which may be delivered
from a motor neuron or a hormone.
3. Extensibility is the ability of a muscle to be stretched. For instance, let's
reconsider our elbow flexing motion we discussed earlier. In order to be able
to flex the elbow, the elbow extensor muscles must extend in order to allow
flexion to occur. Lack of extensibility is known as spasticity.
4. Elasticity is the ability to recoil or bounce back to the muscle's original
length after being stretched.

The Muscular System

Muscle does alot more than just shorten to create movmement!
Read this page for an overview of the numerous functions of this
amazing tissue.
The muscular system is made up of the muscles of the body and the tendons (tough, dense fibrous
bands that join muscle to bone) that connect them to the skeleton.

What is muscle?
Muscle is a type of tissue within our bodies that can create force and change length. Muscles do
this through either a voluntary (over which we have direct control; i.e. walking) or involuntary (over
which we have no direct control; i.e. heart pumping blood) contraction.

There are three different types of muscle within our bodies, these
are:
1. Skeletal muscle

2. Cardiac muscle

3. Smooth muscle

What are the properties of muscle?

All muscle types share the following unique properties that allow them to function properly.

1. Irritable – They are capable of receiving and responding to stimulation from nerves.
2. Contractible – Once they have received stimulation, the muscle is capable of actively shortening
(contracting).
3. Extensible – With the application of force, muscle can be stretched without damage.
4. Elastic - Whenever a muscle has been shortened or lengthened, it has the ability to return to its
resting shape and length.
5. Adaptability – Muscle will hypertrophy (enlarge) in response to increased work. Conversely it
will atrophy (waste away) if it is deprived of work.

What do muscles do?

Each type of muscle also has its own special role that it performs within our bodies. The different
types are able to perform different roles because they each have slight differences in their structural
anatomy.

The roles of the three muscle types are explained in the following table.

Muscle Typ Role

e

Skeletal Skeletal muscles are located beneath the layers of skin and fat. Skeletal muscles connect to tendons
and bones and are responsible for creating movement. Skeletal muscles are under voluntary control.

Cardiac Cardiac muscle is only found in your heart. It contracts and relaxes pumping blood around your
body. Cardiac muscle is an involuntary muscle.

Smooth Smooth muscle forms the walls of most blood vessels, glands and organs within the body. It is
responsible for expanding and contracting allowing blood and fluids to enter and pass through the
vessels and organs at varying rates. Smooth muscle is also involuntary.

It is also worth noting that both cardiac and smooth muscles are fatigue resistant (they don’t tire), as
opposed to skeletal muscle which fatigues relatively easily. This is quite handy really as our life
expectancy would be dramatically less if our heart and blood vessels had to keep taking rest breaks!
Why is muscle important?
When considering the three types of muscle and their specific roles it is easy to see why muscle is
so important. It is muscle that; creates movement by contracting and pulling on our bones, that
continuously works to pump blood and nutrients around the body and even helps with digestion.

So maintaining well conditioned muscle is a necessity if we want to live a healthy life where the body
functions properly and enables us to do our daily chores and participate in all physical activities
effectively.

Muscles and fitness

The muscular system and in particular skeletal muscle go

hand in hand with fitness. Whether you are training for a marathon, to be the world’s next strongest
man or going through rehabilitation, you are working skeletal muscle. This is because you are trying
to improve the capacity of your muscles to run longer distances, to lift heavier loads or improve the
condition and functioning of a specific muscle.

Understanding skeletal muscle and its functions is vital for all personal trainers to complete everyday
tasks such as instructing exercise, assessing a clients movement, correcting exercise technique,
carrying out fitness tests and designing training programmes.

For example when working with clients who want to achieve goals such as improving their upper
body strength or hill running stamina, then it is vital that you have a sound knowledge of the muscles
that work, what stresses to place them under, what exercises to prescribe to work them, what
variables (sets, rest, load) will produce the optimal outcomes, and what adaptations to expect.
The role of skeletal muscle
When discussing the skeletal system we described the movements that can occur at joints, namely;
flexion, extension, abduction, inversion etc. Skeletal muscles produce these movements by pulling
bones in different directions.

Skeletal muscle is attached to bones at either end by

tendons. The attachment end that is relatively fixed is known as the ‘origin’ of the muscle. The
origin is normally proximal (closer) to the trunk. The attachment end that moves most and is
normally distal is known as the ‘insertion’. We see this on the adjacent diagram showing the bicep
muscle which produces flexion at the elbow when it contracts and shortens. The bicep has two (bi =
two) origins, one high on the humerus, the other on the scapula. When the muscle contracts and
shortens it pulls on the insertion points on the radius causing the elbow to flex.

Functions of skeletal muscle

Skeletal muscle has four major functions, these are:

1. Force generation for movement: Skeletal muscle is responsible for generating the force
needed to move the body. Walking, running, swimming, pushing, pulling etc are all movements
created by the contraction of skeletal muscles.
2. Force generation for breathing (respiration): The skeletal muscles of the ribs and abdomen
are responsible for the movements necessary for respiration, as they systematically relax and
contract to enable the lungs to fill with air and then expel the air.

3. Force generation for postural support: Skeletal muscles also stabilise the joints of the body
during movement and help to maintain ideal posture. When a person’s posture is ‘ideal’ the effects
of gravity (pushing down on us) are minimal, weight is evenly distributed through the load bearing
joints of the body; the joints between vertebrae, the hips, knees and ankles and injury risk is
reduced.

4. Heat production: When skeletal muscles contract they produce heat. When body temperature
drops (due to exposure to cold), skeletal muscles can create heat to maintain core body
temperature. They can do this either voluntarily (doing some exercise to warm up, rubbing the
hands together etc) or involuntarily by shivering.