Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Dedication
- Contributors
- Preface
- 1 A. F. Huxley: an essay on his personality and his work on nerve physiology
- 2 A. F. Huxley's research on muscle
- 3 Ultraslow, slow, intermediate, and fast inactivation of human sodium channels
- 4 The structure of the triad: local stimulation experiments then and now
- 5 The calcium-induced calcium release mechanism in skeletal muscle and its modification by drugs
- 6 Hypodynamic tension changes in the frog heart
- 7 Regulation of contractile proteins in heart muscle
- 8 Differential activation of myofibrils during fatigue in twitch skeletal muscle fibres of the frog
- 9 High-speed digital imaging microscopy of isolated muscle cells
- 10 Inotropic mechanism of myocardium
- 11 Regulation of muscle contraction: dual role of calcium and cross-bridges.
- 12 Fibre types in Xenopus muscle and their functional properties.
- 13 An electron microscopist's role in experiments on isolated muscle fibres.
- 14 Structural changes accompanying mechanical events in muscle contraction.
- 15 Mechano-chemistry of negatively strained cross-bridges in skeletal muscle.
- 16 Force response in steady lengthening of active single muscle fibres.
- References
- Index
8 - Differential activation of myofibrils during fatigue in twitch skeletal muscle fibres of the frog
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 07 September 2010
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Dedication
- Contributors
- Preface
- 1 A. F. Huxley: an essay on his personality and his work on nerve physiology
- 2 A. F. Huxley's research on muscle
- 3 Ultraslow, slow, intermediate, and fast inactivation of human sodium channels
- 4 The structure of the triad: local stimulation experiments then and now
- 5 The calcium-induced calcium release mechanism in skeletal muscle and its modification by drugs
- 6 Hypodynamic tension changes in the frog heart
- 7 Regulation of contractile proteins in heart muscle
- 8 Differential activation of myofibrils during fatigue in twitch skeletal muscle fibres of the frog
- 9 High-speed digital imaging microscopy of isolated muscle cells
- 10 Inotropic mechanism of myocardium
- 11 Regulation of muscle contraction: dual role of calcium and cross-bridges.
- 12 Fibre types in Xenopus muscle and their functional properties.
- 13 An electron microscopist's role in experiments on isolated muscle fibres.
- 14 Structural changes accompanying mechanical events in muscle contraction.
- 15 Mechano-chemistry of negatively strained cross-bridges in skeletal muscle.
- 16 Force response in steady lengthening of active single muscle fibres.
- References
- Index
Summary
Introduction
I spent three wonderful years in Professor Sir Andrew Huxley's laboratory at University College, London. When I arrived, I was very surprised and glad to find that he not only could understand my broken and poorly pronounced English, but that he was always extremely patient and calm with my ignorance, and with my naive questions. Thus, very soon he made me feel as if I were at home in a warm, friendly, and productive atmosphere. His kindness, superb knowledge, intelligence, and memory were continuously evident as a marvelous deep fountain from which to learn and acquire education. This education went beyond the walls of the laboratory into many areas of life and was soon complemented by the deep mark that Richenda Huxley also made on my outlook and education. I will never forget one day when Professor Huxley and I were discussing some of my experiments on isotonic recorded contractures, he very soon said something like, “Well, if you have an isotonic lever with such a spring and friction, then the sarcomere length that will be reached during the contracture would be . . . 2.4 μm”. It took him around two seconds to figure out that sarcomere length! After he left I measured the sarcomere length reached during one of such experiments, and it was 2.41 μm! It took me three days to arrive at the same figure he computed in those few seconds in his brain. As we used to say in the laboratory, “His brain goes click, click, click, and the right answer from these elaborate calculations comes out within seconds”.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- Muscular Contraction , pp. 117 - 126Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 1992