Whether or not the atrophic skeletal muscle induces insulin resistance and its mechanisms are not resolved now. The antigravity soleus muscle showed a progressive atrophy in 1-week, 2-week, and 4-week tail-suspended rats. Hyperinsulinemic-euglycemic clamp showed that the steady-state glucose infusion rate was lower in 4-week tail-suspended rats than that in the control rats. The glucose uptake ...

BACKGROUND Axial elongation is a key morphogenetic process that serves to shape developing organisms. Tail extension in the ascidian larva represents a striking example of this process, wherein paraxially positioned muscle cells undergo elongation and differentiation independent of the segmentation process that characterizes the formation of paraxial mesoderm in vertebrates. Investigating the c...

We studied the mechanical properties of deep red aerobic muscle of yellowfin tuna (Thunnus albacares), using both in vivo and in vitro methods. In fish swimming in a water tunnel at 1-3 L s(-1) (where L is fork length), muscle length changes were recorded by sonomicrometry, and activation timing was quantified by electromyography. In some fish a tendon buckle was also implanted on the caudal te...

Some muscle-bone relationships were studied in terms of gastrocnemius muscle weight, femur and tibia length and femur and tibia weight in four lines of mice (CBi-, CBi+, CBi/L and CBi/C) artificially selected for different body conformations and in the unselected control line (CBi). CBi- (low body weight--short tail) and CBi+ (high body weight--long tail) lines were divergently selected followi...

The tadpole larvae of ascidians swim by means of a chordate tail. The tail consists of a central notochord, a muscle band on each side, a small neural tube above the notochord, and an enclosing epidermis. The notochordal and muscle tissue differentiate precociously during development and consequently consist of small numbers of exceptionally large cells, as reported by Conklin (1) and Berrill (...

We present evidence that notochord and muscle differentiation are crucial for morphogenesis of the ascidian tail. We developed a novel approach for embryological manipulation of the developing larval tissues using a simple method to introduce DNA into Ciona intestinalis and the several available tissue-specific promoters. With such promoters, we misexpressed the Xenopus homeobox gene bix in not...

Tail autotomy, the self-induced tail separation from the body, is a common and effective antipredator mechanism in lizards. In this study, we examine the muscle energetics of tail shedding in six lacertid lizard species (Podarcis erhardii, Podarcis peloponnesiaca, Podarcis muralis, Podarcis gaigeae, Podarcis milensis, and Lacerta graeca) from the northeast Mediterranean region. Very long period...

The evolution of the prehensile tail illustrates the impact habitat can have on structural traits. Prehensile primates are able to support their entire body weight using only their tail, which opens up new feeding opportunities in their arboreal environments. This trait evolved separately in two families of New World monkeys. A transitional behaviour in its proposed evolutionary mechanism is ta...