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A three-dimensional chemo-mechanical continuum model for smooth muscle contraction

Markus Böl1, André Schmitz, Götz Nowak

  • 1Institute of Solid Mechanics, Technische Universität Braunschweig, 38106 Braunschweig, Germany. m.boel@tu-bs.de

Journal of the Mechanical Behavior of Biomedical Materials
|August 29, 2012
PubMed

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Smooth muscles are an important type of muscle tissue that plays a vital role in the involuntary movements of internal organs. For example, they help regulate the movement of food through the gut and the flow of blood through the circulatory system.
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Excitation-contraction coupling is a series of events that occur between generating an action potential and initiating a muscle contraction. It occurs at the triad, a structure found in skeletal muscle fibers that comprise a T-tubule and terminal cisternae of the sarcoplasmic reticulum on each side. These triads are visible in longitudinally sectioned muscle fibers. They are typically located at the A-I junction — the junction between the A and I bands of the sarcomere.
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