Making muscle elastic: the structural basis of myomesin stretching

Abstract

Skeletal and cardiac muscles are remarkable biological machines that support and move our bodies and power the rhythmic work of our lungs and hearts. As well as producing active contractile force, muscles are also passively elastic, which is essential to their performance. The origins of both active contractile and passive elastic forces can be traced to the individual proteins that make up the highly ordered structure of muscle. In this Primer, we describe the organization of sarcomeres--the structural units that produce contraction--and the nature of the proteins that make muscle elastic. In particular, we focus on an elastic protein called myomesin, whose novel modular architecture helps explain elasticity.

Figure 1. Schematics of sarcomere and M-band structure derived from electron microscopy of muscle ,.

(a) Relaxed sarcomere. (b) After isometric contraction causing tension in the M-band and sliding between thick filaments; (c) M-band model showing M-bridges connecting thick filaments, as well as additional links connecting M-bridges.