RESUMO
Lumbricals are the intrinsic muscles of the hand resembling the earthworms. During routine dissection of the hand of a 58 years old male cadaver,we found a rare variation of absence of the second,third and fourth lumbricals of the left hand while the right hand showed no abnormality. Lumbricals act as flexor of the metacarpophalangeal joint and extensor of the interphalangeal joint but owing to their movable attachments, their function is difficult to visualize. Variability of the muscle both in morphology and function indicates the ongoing process of evolution.
RESUMO
Objective To study the morphological changes of soleus muscle spindle and electrical activity of neurons in Red Nucleus(RN) of the rat after 2 weeks' simulated weightlessness, and to reveal the interaction between proprioceptive inputs of muscle spindles and reciprocal alterations in RN under simulated weightlessness. Methods Twenty female rats were exposed to weightlessness simulated by tail-suspension for 14 days (SW-14d). Body weight(200-220g) matched female rats were control group(Con). The morphological changes in isolated muscle spindle of soleus muscle, the discharges of red nucleus neurons were observed after 14d tail-suspensions by silver staining and extracellular recording respectively. Results Compared with control group ,the nerve ending of muscle spindle in SW-14d was distorted, degenerated and dissolved; the diameters of intrafusal fibers and capsule in equatorial region of soleus muscle spindles were diminished(P＜0.05). The spontaneous cell activity and discharge of RN neurons (spikes/s) induced by afferent firing from muscle spindles after injection of succinylcholine were reduced after 2 weeks' simulated weightlessness respectively (18.44±5.96 vs. 10.19±6.88, 32.50±8.08 vs. 16.86±5.97, P＜0.01). Conclusion The degeneration of muscle spindle induced by simulated weightlessness may be one of the causes that led to alterations in discharges of RN.