| Abstract: | Recent advances in the knowledge of the structure and function of voluntary muscle and some of its diseases are reviewed on the basis of a recently published international symposium. Among the subjects discussed are: the specific metabolic role of various muscle cell constituents (e.g. sarcosomes, microsomes, sarcoplasmic reticulum); the relaxing factor system and the dual (tonic and phasic) innervation of muscle fibres; observations on the physiology of muscle training; the morphologic differential diagnosis of degenerative skeletal muscle diseases; the value of serum enzyme determinations in the early detection of muscular dystrophy and in the identification of dystrophic carriers; the classification and diagnosis of muscular hypotonias of infancy; the role of inactivity and the trophic control of the nervous system in the development of neural (or denervation) atrophies; factors influencing regeneration of muscle fibres; the significance, as a research tool, of the identification of hereditary primary muscle disease in laboratory animals. |
