ReviewEuropean journal of applied physiology2021
Do skeletal muscle motor units and microvascular units align to help match blood flow to metabolic demand?
Review in European journal of applied physiology, 2021. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 5 papers.
What it found
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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.
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Who cites it
5 citing papers in PubMed, 11 citations in OpenAlex.
- A peripheral perspective on brain health: vascular and skeletal muscle contributions.American journal of physiology. Heart and circulatory physiology · 2026Review
- Clinical physiology: the crucial role of MRI in evaluation of peripheral artery disease.American journal of physiology. Heart and circulatory physiology · 2024Review
- Motor neurons and endothelial cells additively promote development and fusion of human iPSC-derived skeletal myocytes.Skeletal muscle · 2024Article
- Capillary-Mitochondrial Oxygen Transport in Muscle: Paradigm Shifts.Function (Oxford, England) · 2023Review
- Spectroscopy detects skeletal muscle microvascular dysfunction during onset of sepsis in a rat fecal peritonitis model.Scientific reports · 2022Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
4 authors at 1 institution in 1 country.
Funding
Abstract
purposeWe explore the motor unit recruitment and control of perfusion of microvascular units in skeletal muscle to determine whether they coordinate to match blood flow to metabolic demand.
methodsThe PubMed database was searched for historical, current and relevant literature.
resultsA microvascular, or capillary unit consists of 2-20 individual capillaries. Individual capillaries within a capillary unit cannot increase perfusion independently of other capillaries within the unit. Capillary units perfuse a short segment of approx. 12 muscle fibres located beside each other. Motor units consist of muscle fibres that can be dispersed widely within the muscle volume. During a contraction, where not all motor units are recruited, muscle fibre contraction will result in increased perfusion of associated capillaries as well as all capillaries within that capillary unit. Perfusion of the entire capillary unit will result in an increased blood flow delivery to muscle fibres associated with active motor unit plus approximately 11 other inactive muscle fibres within the same region. This will result in an overperfusion of the muscle resulting in blood flow in excess of the muscle fibre needs.
conclusionsGiven the architecture of the capillary units and the dispersed nature of muscle fibres within a motor unit, during submaximal contractions, where not all motor units are recruited, there will be a greater perfusion to the muscle than that predicted by the number of active muscle fibres. Such overperfusion brings into question if blood flow and metabolic demand are as tightly matched as previously assumed.
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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.