HISTORY DEPENDENCE OF SKELETAL MUSCLE FORCE PRODUCTION: A FORGOTTEN PROPERTY

Abstract

Steady-state force enhancement following active muscle stretching has been observed for well over fifty years, and is a widely accepted property of skeletal muscle contraction. Force enhancement has typically been associated with instability of sarcomere length on the descending limb of the force-length relationship. Here, we demonstrate that the sarcomere length non-uniformity paradigm, based on instability, cannot explain much of the newly discovered results. We provide evidence that force enhancement can occur on the stable ascending limb of the force-length relationship, that force enhancement can exceed the isometric tetanic plateau forces, that it is associated with an increased passive force, and that it occurs for perfectly stable sarcomere lengths on the descending limb of the force-length relationship. Combining all the results, we conclude that force enhancement has at least two components, an active and a passive component, that contribute towards the total force enhancement to varying degrees, depending on the contractile history of muscle contraction.