OBJECTIVE To determine whether muscarinic receptor antagonism affects stretching-induced release of ATP. MATERIALS AND METHODS Mucosal strips, dissected from guinea pig (male, 450g; n = 10) urinary bladders, were placed in horizontal organ baths and superfused with Ca(2+) -free Tyrode's solution. Superfusate samples were taken pre- and post- intervention (rapid stretching or relaxation) and A...

OBJECTIVE This study investigated the acute hemodynamic responses to multiple sets of passive stretching exercises performed with and without the Valsalva maneuver. METHODS Fifteen healthy men aged 21 to 29 years with poor flexibility performed stretching protocols comprising 10 sets of maximal passive unilateral hip flexion, sustained for 30 seconds with equal intervals between sets. Protoco...

[Purpose] The purpose of this study was to clarify the influence of high-intensity pulse irradiation with linear polarized near-infrared rays (HI-LPNR) and stretching on hypertonia in cerebrovascular disease patients. [Subjects and Methods] The subjects were 40 cerebrovascular disease patients with hypertonia of the ankle joint plantar flexor muscle. The subjects were randomly allocated to grou...

[Purpose] This research was designed to find out how the so-called "dynamic balance" is affected by doing different types of warm up exercises. In particular, the research is focused on the difference in the effect on dynamic Balance of warming up in water versus on the ground. [Subjects and Methods] Twenty healthy adults were the subjects of this study, with 10 people assigned each to two grou...

Stimulated Raman scattering (SRS) microscopy has opened up a wide range of biochemical imaging applications by probing a particular Raman-active molecule vibrational mode in the specimen. However, the original implementation with picosecond pulse excitation can only realize rapid chemical mapping with a single Raman band. Here we present a novel SRS microscopic technique using a grating-based p...

In Brief: Stretching recommendations are clouded by misconceptions and conflicting research reports. This review of the current literature on stretching and range-of-motion increases finds that one static stretch of 15 to 30 seconds per day is sufficient for most patients, but some require longer durations. Heat and ice improve the effectiveness of static stretching only if applied during the s...