Muscle Maps

Every move you make is possible due to your skeletal muscles. These muscles differ in their mechanical and biological properties but how these are controlled at a molecular and cellular level is poorly understood. Researchers now construct an atlas of active genes and cell components in six different leg muscles using tissue samples collected from healthy men. Large-scale RNA analysis and cell highlighting by immunohistochemistry (pictured) revealed different levels of active genes, cell types and proteins, such as myosin heavy chain proteins (red, green, blue) present in muscle fibres. This revealed that muscles clustered into three main groups based on cell types present, with varying levels of active genes across groups. For example, muscles with higher levels of active slow-twitch muscle fibre genes contained more endothelial cells and blood capillaries. The results are now available as an open-source, interactive leg muscle atlas – a novel resource to help study the molecular features of muscles.

Written by Lux Fatimathas

Lux Fatimathas

Writer

Having pursued science through a career in research, communications and publishing, she is currently a writer and editor for a healthcare marketing agency and also juggles freelance science writing.

• Image from work by Tooba Abbassi-Daloii and colleagues
• Department of Human Genetics, Leiden University Medical Center, Leiden, Netherlands
• Image originally published with a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0)
• Published in eLife, February 2023