Effect of ageing on ultrastructure of slow and fast skeletal muscle tendon in rabbit Achilles tendons

Abstract

This reports presents the changing morphological characteristics of collagen and fibroblasts in the soleus and gastrocnemius muscle tendon of female Japanese white rabbits with ageing. The fibroblasts decreased in number per 37 microns 2 with ageing in each group, and their morphology became longer and more slender through ageing. The mean fibril area and diameter of the collagen fibrils of soleus muscle tendon (SMT) and lateral gastrocnemius muscle tendon (GMT) in 8- to 10-month old rabbits were significantly higher than those of 3-wk-old rabbits during growth (P < 0.01). The mean area and diameter of collagen fibrils of SMT and GMT decreased during senescence: the values for 4- to 5-yr-old rabbits were lower than those for 8- to 10-month-old rabbits, but the difference was not significant. Statistically significant differences in fibril area and diameter between the SMT and GMT were not found during ageing. The number of thick fibrils increased during growth, but decreased in senescence. There were more thin fibrils (30-60 nm) in the 3-wk-old rabbits than in the 8- to 10-month old and 4 to 5-yr-old groups, and the large-diameter collagen (300-360 nm) was more abundant in the 8- to 10-month-old group than in the 3-wk-old and 4- to 5-yr-old groups. Differences in fibril size between slow and fast muscle tendons were not observed during ageing.

Life-long endurance running is associated with reduced glycation and mechanical stress in connective tissue

“…It has been previously shown that heavy slow resistance training is associated with changes in fibril morphology (Kongsgaard et al 2010), and in addition, aging has been observed to reduce the size and/or density of collagen fibrils both in animals (Curwin et al 1994;Nakagawa et al 1994;Parry et al 1978;PattersonKane et al 1997) and humans (Sargon et al 2005;Strocchi et al 1991). In the present study, we did not find any significant effects on fibril morphology with age or training, although there was a tendency for lower collagen fibril density with age (p=0.084).…”

“…It appears that endurance training in aging animals yield a stronger and more compliant tendon (Gosselin et al 1998;Viidik et al 1996;Simonsen et al 1995;LaCroix et al 2013;Nielsen et al 1998), but this remains to be confirmed in a human model. Furthermore, at the microstructural level, the size and/or density of tendon collagen fibrils seems to be reduced with aging (Curwin et al 1994;Nakagawa et al 1994;Partington and Wood 1963;Patterson-Kane et al 1997), but if these age-related adaptations are influenced by physical activity remains unknown (Edwards et al 2005).…”

Effects of 50 Days Ovomet Supplementation on Biomechanical Parameters and Subjective Pain Perception among Old Institutionalized Patients. A Preliminary Study

“…This result seems to indicate that this test can be very useful for measuring effects of joints supplementation or another method for the treatment of joints problems such as physiotherapy or exercise. Our results indicate an increase in linear stiffness of AT in the elderly with the administration of Ovomet ® , when the normal behavior is the decrease of this parameter with ageing [16][17][18], the opposite of what happens during the passage from childhood to adulthood (5 to 12 years) [19,20], which report an increase in linear stiffness of the AT as a consequence of weight gain and increased loads in tendon.…”

Nutritional and developmental effects on the intrinsic properties of muscles as they relate to the eating quality of beef

“…Morphological changes are evident in both collagen and fibroblasts with increased animal age, fibroblasts decrease in number, while collagen fibril size increases (Nakagawa et al 1994). The number of crosslinks within collagen increases, such that the extracellular matrix becomes a stable multi-valent network (Robins et al 1973) leading to high viscoelasticity and low compliance (Rodrigues et al 1996).…”