Incubating Isolated Mouse EDL Muscles with Creatine Improves Force Production and Twitch Kinetics in Fatigue Due to Reduction in Ionic Strength

Creatine supplementation can improve performance during high intensity exercise in humans and improve muscle strength in certain myopathies. In this present study, we investigated the direct effects of acute creatine incubation on isolated mouse fast-twitch EDL muscles, and examined how these effects change with fatigue. muscle from mice aged 12–14 weeks was isolated and stimulated with field electrodes to measure force characteristics in 3 different states: (i) before fatigue; (ii) immediately after a fatigue protocol; and (iii) after recovery. These served as the control measurements for the muscle. The muscle was then incubated in a creatine solution and washed. The measurement of force characteristics in the 3 different states was then repeated. In un-fatigued muscle, creatine incubation increased the maximal tetanic force. In fatigued muscle, creatine treatment increased the force produced at all frequencies of stimulation. Incubation also increased the rate of twitch relaxation and twitch contraction in fatigued muscle. During repetitive fatiguing stimulation, creatine-treated muscles took 55.1±9.5% longer than control muscles to lose half of their original force. Measurement of weight changes showed that creatine incubation increased EDL muscle mass by 7%. sensitivity of contractile proteins as a result of ionic strength decreases following creatine incubation

Low-dose exercise training does not influence cardiac autonomic control in healthy sedentary men aged 55-75 years

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The effect of physical intervention programmes on coordination quality of the lower limbs in persons with multiple sclerosis

Introduction: For many years, MS patients have been advised to avoid physical activity, because symptoms may worsen with an elevated body temperature. However recent research has shown beneficial effects of exercise training in MS. The present study investigates the coordination quality in terms of stability and accuracy of bilateral leg movements in MS patients before, during and after 20 weeks of exercise therapy. Methods: Thirty-three MS patients (EDSS) score between 1.5-6.5 were included in this study. Subjects were stratified by EDSS score and randomly assigned to a MS control group (CO, N=8) or one of three interventions groups: resistance training group (RES, N=9), resistance training + electro stimulation group (RES+ES, N=8), or whole body vibration group (WBV, N=8). The intervention programs consisted of 50 training sessions. The CO group did not participate in any training program. This abstract will only discuss data at baseline and after a 10-week period of intervention as the complete training period is not yet finished. Data analyses focused on the relative phasing between the limbs. Two movement patterns: in-phase relative phase Ö = 0° and anti-phase relative phase Ö = 180° were studied at 0.75 Hz,1.00 Hz, 1.25 Hz and1.50 Hz respectively. Results: There was no obvious effect of the different intervention programs on the motor performance scores. In all groups, in-phase coordination was performed with higher accuracy (AE=8.70°) and stability (SD=11.11°) than anti-phase movements (AE=13.43°, SD=17.50°) at all frequencies. This study shows that different forms of strength training do not influence the phasing accuracy and stability of in-phase and anti-phase coordination patterns in MS patients. These preliminary results should be considered with reservation, because a small increase in strength was achieved after the first intervention period. Therefore it is possible neural enhancements did not occur yet that allow to improve coordination