Muscle attachment sites and behavioral reconstruction: An experimental test of muscle-bone structural response to...

Behavioral reconstruction from muscle attachment sites (entheses) is a common practice in anthropology. However, experimental evidence provides mixed support for the assumed association between enthesis size and shape with changes in habitual activity. In this study, a laboratory mouse model was used to experimentally test whether activity level and type alters muscle architecture and the underlying bone cross-sectional geometry of entheses in order to assess the underlying assumption that behavioral changes lead to quantifiable differences in both muscle and enthesis morphology.

Female wild-type mice were separated into one control group and two experimentally increased activity groups (running, climbing) over an 11-week study period. At the start of the experiment, half of the mice were 4 weeks and half were 7 weeks of age. The postmortem deltoideus and biceps brachii muscles were measured for potential force production (physiological cross-sectional area) and potential muscle excursion (fiber length). Bone cross-sectional geometry variables were measured from microCT scans of the humerus and radius at the enthesis and non-enthesis regions of interest across activity groups.

Activity level and type altered potential force production and potential muscle excursion of both muscles in the younger cohort. We observed differences in cortical bone geometry in both the humerus enthesis and radius non-enthesis region driven exclusively among the younger wheel-running mice.

These results indicate that in addition to muscle architectural changes, bone structural properties at the enthesis do show an adaptive response to increased activity, such as running but only during earlier development. However, further research is required in order to apply these findings to the reconstruction of living behavior from anthropological specimens.