Muscles

muscle n. 1. a tissue composed of bundles of elongated cells capable of contraction and relaxation to produce movement in an organ or part ~ from the Latin musculus, meaning little mouse, from the imagined resemblance of some muscles to mice, from Latin mus, meaning mouse,

Collins Dictionary of The English Language [First Published 1979]

The ancient Romans used the word musculus, which means little mouse, for muscles. How did the Romans come to choose this name? If you bend and straighten your arm at the elbow, you should see the front of the upper arm move under the skin. To the ancient Romans this movement resembled a little mouse scurrying beneath the skin

Muscles are one of those things that most of us take completely for granted, but they are incredibly important for two major reasons

1.      Muscles are the "engine" that our bodies use to propel ourselves. Although they work differently than a car engine or an electric motor, muscles do the same thing - they turn energy into motion

2.      It would be impossible for you to do anything without your muscles. Absolutely everything that you conceive of with your brain is expressed as muscular motion. The only ways for you to express an idea are with the muscles of your larynx, mouth and tongue [spoken words], with the muscles of your fingers [written words or "talking with your hands"] or with the skeletal muscles [body language, dancing, running, building or fighting, to name a few]

Because muscles are so crucial to any animal, they are incredibly sophisticated:

·        They are efficient at turning fuel into motion

·        They are long-lasting

·        They are self-healing

·        They are able to grow stronger with practice

·        They do everything from allowing you to walk to keeping your blood flowing

The cells that make up muscles contract and then relax back to original size. Tiny microscopic fibres in these cells compress by sliding in past each other like a sliding glass door being opened and then shut again. The cells of your muscles use chemical energy from the food you eat to do this. Without food, and particular kinds of nutrients, your muscles wouldn't be able to make the energy to contract

Some muscles are known as "voluntary", that is, they only work when you specifically tell them to. Do you want to say something? Or swing a bat? Or attached a rope? Or rub your hands together to keep warm? These are voluntary movements. Others, like the muscular contracting of your heart, the movement of your diaphragm so that you can breathe, or blinking your eyes are automatic. They're called involuntary movements. And how do any of these muscles move? Through signals from your nerves, and, in some cases, your brain, as well

Isotonic vs. Isometric Contraction – the shortening of muscle fibres creates mechanical force, or muscle tension. Whether the muscle itself changes length [same-force or isotonic contraction] or not [same-length or isometric contraction] depends upon the load attached to the muscle

For example, your biceps muscle is attached to your shoulder blade at one end and to your ulna in your forearm at the other end. When the biceps contract, it shortens and pulls the ulna toward the shoulder blade [the ulna is attached to the elbow joint]. This movement allows you to lift your forearm and a given load

Yes. If you hear someone says that they have "pulled" a muscle, they have, in fact, torn a muscle in the same way that you can tear a ligament or break a bone. And, like these other living body parts, with a little help, they generally mend themselves

• Thirty facial muscles create looks like surprise, happiness, sadness, and frowning
• Eye muscles are the busiest muscles in the body. Scientists estimate they may move more than 100,000 times a day
• Largest muscle in the body is the gluteus maximus muscle in the buttocks Girth is proportionate to strength, so it follows, without consideration of lever arms, torques and kinesiological principles that it is the strongest
• It takes 10 muscles to smile, 12 muscles to frown ... and 1 to make a difference!
• Smallest muscle in our body is in the ear and is called stapedius
• Longest muscle in our body is the sartorius muscle. It is narrow and ribbon-like and stems from the iliac spine and the upper half of the notch below it. It slants across the front of the upper thigh from the side to the middle and then descends vertically to the knee. It ends in a tendon that expands to be inserted into the surface of the body of the tibia (leg bone)
• Muscles are attached to our bones by tendons and other tissues. They exert force by converting chemical energy into tension and contraction
• Muscles move and make us capable of a variety of actions by simply contracting and becoming shorter
• Muscles are made up of millions of tiny protein filaments which work together to produce motion in the body

·        Muscles contract to move bones and body parts

·        Muscles look either striated or smooth

- Striated muscle has stripes or striations in it

- Smooth muscle does not

·        Also, muscles are labelled as either voluntary or involuntary

- Voluntary muscles are muscles that you can move whenever you want to

- Involuntary muscles contract and relax automatically inside your body

   We cannot control our involuntary muscles