The Different Type of Muscle Tissue

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If it contracts and is in the body, it is a muscle. Muscles are made up of soft tissues that form together in patterns to create different types of muscles. It is important to remember that muscles can only contract, they cannot push. It is for this reason that muscles work in pairs. Muscles are categorized by either voluntary or involuntary movements and different types of tissue make these up.

The exception to this rule is the diaphragm. It is different as it both acts on its own (involuntary) to control breathing (you don't have to think about breathing) but you can also  move it yourself and control the rate of breathing by moving it (voluntary).

There are three types of muscle tissues and each differ because they have a different job to perform. As discussed, muscles typically work in pairs to counteract their movements. This is most typical with muscles responsible for movement and posture. The three types of muscles groups are skeletal, smooth and cardiac.

Skeletal muscles are those attached to the skeleton and control body movements and keeping the body in position. There are exceptions to this rule such as the tongue and diaphragm not being attached to the skeleton. Skeletal muscles can usually be arranged into 4 categories:

-  Flexor, a muscle to bend a joint

-  Extensor, a muscle to straighten a joint

-  Abductor, a muscle to move a body part away from the bodies centerline

-  Adductor, a muscle to move a body part towards the bodies centerline

Cardiac muscles are those found in the heart and associated respiratory muscles. Cardiac muscle is designed to contract and do so many times over its lifespan. The muscle cells themselves are designed much like skeletal muscle to be very strong and also joined to one another in a linear fashion. However, unlike skeletal muscles, cardiac muscle fibers branch out and communicate with each other. Electrical impulses are carried between each muscle by an intercalated disc to ensure communication is maintain with the nervous system and brain. The overall goal of cardiac muscles is to ensure blood gets around the body.

Finally, we have smooth muscle tissue which makes up the remainder that skeletal and cardiac does not cover. Examples of these include internal organs, blood vessels and the eyes. Where cardiac muscles are built for a high volume of strong contractions, smooth muscle tissue is built for slow and prolonged contraction. Smooth muscles are typically arranged in layers and vary in size to a huge extent. They normally make up muscles that react to involuntary movements.

We have seen that all muscles are not the same. Because muscles have different jobs to do and are put under different kinds of stress the human body adapts to this by creating these different types of muscles. How the cells are arranged and how they react to different stimuli (electrical, hormonal or autonomic) show how the different types become suitable for different jobs. The skeletal muscles are used least often but are powerful when called upon. Cardiac muscle need to be strong and able to provide fast and powerful movements in many repetitions. Smooth muscle tissue is used often but in the opposite way its cardiac counterpart.

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