Abstract
Muscle fatigue induced by consecutive twitches or tetani was studied in single skeletal muscle fibers of the frog, Rana japonica. The fatigue by twitch appeared sooner after the start of stimulation at lower temperatures (2–5°C) than at higher ones (15–20°C), while the fatigue by tetanus appeared sooner at higher temperatures. When a twitch-fatigued fiber was bathed in a solution with caffeine (15 mM), the contracture force was much higher than the fatigued force, while in tetanus fatigue, the force by caffeine was not different from the fatigued force. The length-force relation in fatigued fibers was compared with that in pre-fatigue at low and high temperatures. It was noticed that the ascending limb of the length-force curve in fatigued fibers by twitch was lower than that in pre-fatigue at the low temperatures; namely, the fatigue by twitch was more marked in shorter muscle length, while no marked change in the length-force relation was detected in the tetanus fatigue at the low and high temperatures. The maximum shortening velocity, measured by the slack test, decreased in both types of fatigue. These results suggest that the fatigue by twitch may be mainly due to the failure of activation of the contractile system, while in the fatigue by tetanus, the rate of the interaction between actin and myosin may be impaired due to the change in intracellular chemical environment.
