Șef lucr. dr.

Grigoraş Adriana

FACULTY OF MEDICINE

Practical work no. 9

Muscle tissue (2 hours)

Striated muscle tissue– tongue. Smooth muscle tissue – stomach, jejunum. Cardiac muscle tissue
– myocardium (demonstrative slide – iron haematoxylin)

Bibliography
Junqueira LC, Carneiro J, Basic Histology. Text and Atlas, 11th. ed., McGraw-Hill
Companies, New-York, 2005
Ross MH, Pawlina W, Histology. A text and atlas With Correlated Cell and Molecular
Biology, 7th edition, Wolters Kluwer Health, 2015

Muscle tissue

There are 3 types of muscles:

- skeletal muscle
- cardiac muscle
- smooth muscle

Skeletal muscle is a form of striated muscle tissue existing under control of the somatic
nervous system. Skeletal muscle is made up of individual components known as muscle
fibers. These fibers are formed from the fusion of developmental myoblasts (a type of
embryonic progenitor cell that gives rise to a muscle cell). The myofibers (muscle fiber)
are long, cylindrical, multinucleated cells composed of actin and myosin myofibrils
repeated as a sarcomere, the basic functional unit of the cell and responsible for skeletal
muscle's striated appearance and forming the basic machinery necessary for muscle
contraction. The term muscle refers to multiple bundles of muscle fibers held together by
connective tissue.

Longitudinal sections through muscle fibers clearly depict the characteristic

striation, the regular pattern of alternating light and dark cross-bands. Every muscle fiber
contains numerous rod-shaped or oval nuclei in the cell periphery, close to the

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sarcolemma. There are alternating light and dark bands, with the dark bands being wider
than the light ones. The dark cross-striations appear strongly birefringent in polarized
light (anisotropic, A-bands ). The light bands are refringent ( isotropic, I-bands ).
Between the muscle fibers exist a loose connectivetissue - endomysium, which consists
mostly of reticular fibers. The principal cytoplasmic proteins are myosin and actin (also
known as "thick" and "thin" filaments, respectively) which are arranged in a repeating
unit called a sarcomere. The interaction of myosin and actin is responsible for muscle
contraction.

The plasma membrane is called the sarcolemma with the cytoplasm known as the
sarcoplasm. In the sarcoplasm are the myofibrils. The myofibrils are long protein bundles
about 1 micrometer in diameter each containing myofilaments. Pressed against the inside
of the sarcolemma are the unusual flattened nuclei. Between the myofibrils are the
mitochondria. While the muscle fiber does not have a smooth endoplasmic reticulum it
contains a sarcoplasmic reticulum. The sarcoplasmic reticulum surrounds the myofibrils
and holds a reserve of the calcium ions needed to cause a muscle contraction.
Periodically it has dilated end sacs known as terminal cisternae. These cross the muscle
fiber from one side to the other. In between two terminal cisternae is a tubular infoldings
called a transverse tubule (T tubule). The T tubule are the pathway for the action potential
to signal the sarcoplasmic reticulum to release calcium causing a muscle contraction.
Together two terminal cisternae and a transverse tubule form a triad.

Cardiac muscle is a type of involuntary striated muscle found in the walls and histologic
foundation of the heart, specifically the myocardium. Cardiac muscle exhibits cross
striations formed by alternating segments of thick and thin protein filaments. Like
skeletal muscle, the primary structural proteins of cardiac muscle are actin and myosin.
The actin filaments are thin causing the lighter appearance of the I bands in striated
muscle, while the myosin filament is thicker lending a darker appearance to the
alternating A bands as observed with electron microscopy.

Like the skeletal musculature, the heart muscle tissue is striated. In contrast to
skeletal muscles, cardiac muscle fibers are branched and anastomose with each other,
thus creating a network. Cardiac muscle cells have only one nucleus.

Intercalated discs are complex adhering structures which connect single cardiac
myocytes to an electrochemical syncytium (in contrast to the skeletal muscle, which
becomes a multicellular syncytium during mammalian embryonic development) and are
mainly responsible for force transmission during muscle contraction. Intercalated discs
also support the rapid spread of action potentials and the synchronized contraction of the
myocardium. Under light microscopy, intercalated discs appear as thin, typically dark-
staining lines dividing adjacent cardiac muscle cells. The intercalated discs run
perpendicular to the direction of muscle fibers.

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Smooth muscle is an involuntary non-striated muscle. Smooth muscle is found in many

places; within the tunica media layer of large (aorta) and small arteries, arterioles,veins,
lymphatic vessels, the urinary bladder, uterus, male and female reproductive tracts,
gastrointestinal tract, respiratory tract, arrector pili of skin, the ciliary muscle, and iris of
the eye. Smooth muscle fibers have a fusiform shape. Their nuclei reside in the centers of
the cells. Light microscopy and the usual staining procedures do not bring out any
particular structures in the cytoplasm or the embedded myofibrils.

The major protein components of smooth muscle thin filaments are actin,
tropomyosin and caldesmon. Smooth muscle cells possess abundant adherens junctions
that anchor actin filaments and intermediate filaments which also interact with dense
bodies. Dense bodies and adherens junctions are rich in the protein actinin which is also a
predominate Z-line protein in striated muscle. There is an organized cytoskeleton
consisting of the intermediate filament proteins vimentin and desmin, along with actin
filament, that interact with adherens junctions in the sarcolemma and dense bodies in the
cytoplasm. The sarcolemma possess microdomains specialized to cell-signaling events
and ion channels called caveolae.