ArticleJournal of the Royal Society, Interface2015
The effect of intramuscular fat on skeletal muscle mechanics: implications for the elderly and obese.
Article in Journal of the Royal Society, Interface, 2015. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 130 papers, 4 of them syntheses that pooled it.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
130 citing papers in PubMed, 4 syntheses or guidelines pooled it, 237 citations in OpenAlex.
- Knee Extensor Structure and Function in Children, Adolescents, Adults, and Older Adults With Obesity: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis.Obesity reviews : an official journal of the International Association for the Study of Obesity · 2025Pooled it
- Pooled it
- Preserved Muscle Strength Despite Muscle Mass Loss After Bariatric Metabolic Surgery: a Systematic Review and Meta-analysis.Obesity surgery · 2023Pooled it
- Effects of Overweight/Obesity on Motor Performance in Children: A Systematic Review.Frontiers in endocrinology · 2021Pooled it
- Trial
- Comparison between movement pattern training and strengthening on muscle volume, muscle fat, and strength in patients with hip-related groin pain: An exploratory analysis.Journal of orthopaedic research : official publication of the Orthopaedic Research Society · 2022Trial
- Comparison of morphological changes of gluteus medius and abductor strength for total hip arthroplasty via posterior and modified direct lateral approaches.International orthopaedics · 2019Trial
- Mechanisms Influencing Maximum Joint Range of Motion and Stiffness: A Narrative Review.Sports medicine (Auckland, N.Z.) · 2026Review
- An RNA thermogenic therapy to preserve lean mass and enhance metabolic health during GLP-1 weight loss.Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2026Article
- Bioprinted vascularized soft-tissue flaps with an integrated arterial-venous loop.Cell biomaterials · 2026Article
- The Impact of Ageing on Skeletal Muscle: Roles of Mitochondrial Dysregulation, Systemic Communication, and Exercise.Journal of cellular physiology · 2026Review
- Decreased Thigh Muscle Cross-Sectional Area Following Anterior Cruciate Ligament Injury Depends on Concomitant Meniscal Injury and Subject Sex.Journal of orthopaedic research : official publication of the Orthopaedic Research Society · 2026Article
- Lifespan approaches for the prevention and management of steatotic liver disease.Nature reviews. Gastroenterology & hepatology · 2026Review
- Gearing in the human medial gastrocnemius: effects of contraction conditions, tissue stiffness, and echo intensity.European journal of applied physiology · 2026Article
- GLP-1 Receptor Agonists for Obesity Management in Older Adults: A Scoping Review on the Risk of Sarcopenia and Sarcopenic Obesity.Current nutrition reports · 2026Article
- Lumbar muscle morphology and composition in adolescent idiopathic scoliosis: a magnetic resonance study.Spine deformity · 2026Article
- Elevated Kallistatin Induces Myosteatosis and Exercise Intolerance by Antagonizing AdipoR1-Mediated AMPK Signalling.Journal of cachexia, sarcopenia and muscle · 2026Article
- Association between TMG-derived contractile muscle parameters and MRI-based muscle structure in sarcopenia.BMC musculoskeletal disorders · 2026Article
- From twitch to relaxation: Obesity dysregulates muscle contractile function.Physiological reports · 2026Article
- Perfluorooctane sulfonic acid (PFOS) perturbs skeletal muscle oxidative phosphorylation by a different mechanism than liver.Chemosphere · 2026Article
70 more citing papers are in PubMed but not listed here.
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
3 authors at 1 institution in 1 country.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Skeletal muscle accumulates intramuscular fat through age and obesity. Muscle quality, a measure of muscle strength per unit size, decreases in these conditions. It is not clear how fat influences this loss in performance. Changes to structural parameters (e.g. fibre pennation and connective tissue properties) affect the muscle quality. This study investigated the mechanisms that lead to deterioration in muscle performance due to changes in intramuscular fat, pennation and aponeurosis stiffness. A finite-element model of the human gastrocnemius was developed as a fibre-reinforced composite biomaterial containing contractile fibres within the base material. The base-material properties were modified to include intramuscular fat in five different ways. All these models with fat generated lower fibre stress and muscle quality than their lean counterparts. This effect is due to the higher stiffness of the tissue in the fatty models. The fibre deformations influence their interactions with the aponeuroses, and these change with fatty inclusions. Muscles with more compliant aponeuroses generated lower forces. The muscle quality was further reduced for muscles with lower pennation. This study shows that whole-muscle force is dependent on its base-material properties and changes to the base material due to fatty inclusions result in reductions to force and muscle quality.
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What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.