Cross-bridge movement in fast and slow skeletal muscles of the chick

1. Fast (posterior latissimus dorsi, PLD) and slow (anterior latissimus dorsi, ALD) muscles of the chick were studied by time-resolved X-ray diffraction using a synchrotron radiation source. 2. In both muscles and at both 20 and 30 degrees C, intensities of the X-ray equatorial reflections changed faster than tension at the beginning of tetanus. When the intensity change was converted into the mass transfer from the thick to the thin filament, the difference between the half-rise times of the transfer and tension development at 20 degrees C was 140 ms in ALD and 37 ms in PLD. At 30 degrees C it was 110 ms and 10-20 ms for ALD and PLD respectively. 3. These results indicate that in the early stage of contraction, some of the myosin heads in the vicinity of the thin filament are developing little or no tension, and suggest that the fast and slow muscles differ in the transition rate of myosin heads from the state of attachment with low tension to that with high tension.