Muscular & Skeletal System Flashcards
what is the characteristic of skeletal muscles?
- you can control it –> voluntary - its purpose is to body movement –> attached to bones - motor units – consists of groups of muscle cells –> multinucleate - microscopic appearance –> striated (because of the actin and myosin/ Sarcomere
What are the layers of a muscle?
a whole muscle (bundle of fascicle) Fascicle (bundle of muscle cells) Muscle cell (bundle of Microfibril) - Myofiber Mycofibril (surrounded by cell plasma, wrapped by sarcoplasmic reticulum) Sarcomere Actin & Myosin
what wraps around the microfibril – What is it for? what is a microfibril?
- storage of Ca which is vital for contraction
what does the “T” in the T-tubule stand for?
transverse tubule - connected to the cell membrane that allows the propagation of action potential
Where does the striation of muscle come from?
Dark and light bands? What are the structural differences that cause the difference in lighting absorption?
What are the four steps in the sliding filament theory? in which step does the “sliding” occur? Does that step require power/energy/ATP? Which steps require ATP?
in which step of the sliding filament theory is myosin at its highest energy state? what is its high energy conformation? how does it obtain this high energy state?
Why do we need Ca for muscle contraction?
When does “cross-bridge formation” happen?
What does the binding of ATP do to the “cross bridge formation” ?
Can muscles contract in the absence of ATP? can a power stroke occur in the absence of ATP? aren’t these the same questions? why not?
does “cross-bridge formation” occur uniformly across the microfibril?
If your team is trying to pull a stone uphill, what happens when y’all let go (detach from the actin) simultaneously?
Thus, myosin head groups must operate … ?
asynchronously
What are the other two proteins involved with actin?
Troponin and tropomyosin
- Actin is series of small units binding together into a helix. Tropomyosin is a two-stranded alpha-helical coiled-coil protein that surrounds the actin. Troponin is a small molecule binding tropomyosin.
- When Ca binds to troponin, tropomyosin changes its conformation revealing the myosin binding site.
Calcium binds to what on the actin?
troponin
where are the myosin binding sites?
tropomyosin changes its conformation revealing the binding site on actin.
what happens when Ca is not being removed from the muscle cells?
The muscle won’t be able to relax and cannot contract.
What are two possible ways that prevent the muscle from relaxing thus leading to the inability to contract?
What does a motor unit consist of?
a neuron connected to muscle cells
what does the size of a motor unit depend on?
does fine movement require small or large motor units? and how many? (a lot or a few)
What is the relationship between the number of motor units and the size of units?
the number of muscle cells connected to the neuron.
fine movement requires a large number of small motor units. this is because fine movement requires precision and not force.
larger motor units will be activated when the body requires more strength. often time when the size of units goes up, the number of motor units go down. Make sense if you think out it… you want a large group of muscles to behave in the same manner (lifting something)
what does the amount of force generated depend on?
number of motor units activated
What are the energy sources that muscle cells can use? There are three to be exact. one is faster than the other. Each source is used depending on the type of activity
- The fastest form of energy is actually drawn from creatine-P. Creatine-P donates its P converting ADP into ATP. But this is only short term energy and not sustainable.
- The other source is anaerobic preparation – Glycolysis (2 ATP)
- Aerobic respiration (oxidative phosphorylation) yield 30 ATP, CO2 and more.
so you know that hemoglobin is the protein that carries oxygen in the blood, correct?
What is the protein that carries oxygen for muscle cells? what is the prefix that is used very often in naming things related to muscle?
why is lactic acid produced and accumulated in muscle during exercise?
when you exercise for a prolonged period of time, you deplete stored oxygen. Without oxygen creb cycle and oxidative phosphorylation cannot run because they run out of electron carried NAD and FAD.
Glycolysis needs NAD to run. NADH is reduced converting pyruvate into lactic acid in the fermentation pathway. In other words, fermentation pathways results in the reduction of NADH into NAD allowing for the continuation of glycolysis.
What happens to our oxygen level after exercise?
we depleted the oxygen stored in myoglobin. We need to increase myoglobin level of saturation and to oxidize lactin acid. we can have excess lactin acid sitting around in the body.