Muscle contraction mechanism based on single molecule measurements

Abstract

Single molecule measurements have shown that a muscle myosin step is driven by biased Brownian movement. Furthermore, they have also demonstrated that in response to strain in the backward direction a detached myosin head preferentially attaches to the forward direction due to an accelerated transition from a weak binding to strong binding state. Because they are consistent with the original Huxley model for muscle contraction, we have built a model that describes macroscopic muscle characteristics based on these single molecule results. © 2012 The Author(s).