Chapter 10: Muscular System: Histology and Physiology

Chapter Objectives

  1. List the major categories of muscles, and describe their general characteristics.
  2. Describe the structure of a muscle, including its connective tissue elements, blood vessels, and nerves.
  3. Diagram the arrangement of myofilaments, myofibrils, sarcomeres, sarcoplasmic reticulum, and T tubules in a muscle fiber.
  4. Explain the events responsible for the transmission of an action potential across the neuromuscular junction.
  5. Describe the events that result in muscle contraction and relation in response to an action potential in a motor neuron.
  6. Explain how muscle tone is maintained and how slow contraction and relation occur in skeletal muscle.
  7. Describe how the length of a muscle influences the force of contraction.
  8. Compare the mechanisms involved in psychologic fatigue, muscular fatigue, and synaptic fatigue.
  9. Explain the causes of physiologic contracture and rigor mortis.
  10. Describe the events that lead to an oxygen debt and recovery from it.
  11. Distinguish between fast-twitch muscles and slow-twitch muscles, and explain the functions for which each type is best adapted.
  12. Predict the effects of both aerobic exercise and anaerobic exercise on the structure and function of skeletal muscle.
  13. Explain the events responsible for the generation of heat produced by muscle before, during, and after exercise and when shivering.
  14. List the types of smooth muscle, and describe the characteristics of each.
  15. Describe the relationship between the resting membrane potential, action potentials, and contraction in smooth muscle.
  16. Compare the unique structural and functional characteristics of smooth muscle with those of skeletal muscle.
  17. Compare the structural and functional characteristics of cardiac muscle with those of skeletal muscle.

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