Elsevier

Journal of the Neurological Sciences

Volume 7, Issue 2, September–October 1968, Pages 301-307
Journal of the Neurological Sciences

Fast and slow twitch muscles in man

https://doi.org/10.1016/0022-510X(68)90150-0Get rights and content

Abstract

  • 1.

    (1) An investigation has been made of the twitch responses of 4 different human muscles.

  • 2.

    (2) The first dorsal interosseus muscle of the hand and the extensor digitorum brevis muscle of the foot had twitches which were significantly faster than that of the gastrocnemius and significantly slower than that of the frontalis muscle.

  • 3.

    (3) The results are interpreted as providing suggestive evidence for the existence of fast and slow muscles in man.

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    The time-course of twitch torque or force (e.g. contraction and half relaxation times) induced by a single electrical stimulus has been well utilized to investigate the muscle contractile properties of mammalian species (Close and Hoh, 1968; Cooper and Eccles, 1930; Ranatunga, 1977). In human muscles in vivo, many attempts (Belanger and McComas, 1985; Davies et al., 1987; McComas and Thomas, 1968; Pääsuke et al., 1999; Rice et al., 1988; Sale et al., 1982; Vandervoort and McComas, 1983) have been made to determine the time-course of twitch contraction by examining the triceps surae as the greatest contributor to plantar flexion torque. These weight-bearing muscles have important roles in various human movements; e.g. bipedal locomotion (Fukunaga et al., 2001; Hof et al., 2002) and stabilization of the body mass during quiet stance (Masani et al., 2003).

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    2003, Handbook of Clinical Neurophysiology
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