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Lookup NU author(s): Emeritus Professor Clarke Slater
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Copyright © 2024 American Physiological Society. All rights reserved. Neuromuscular transmission is the process by which motor neurons activate muscle contraction and thus plays an essential role in generating the purposeful body movements that aid survival. While many features of this process are common throughout the Animal Kingdom, such as the release of transmitter in multimolecular "quanta," and the response to it by opening ligand-gated postsynaptic ion channels, there is also much diversity between and within species. Much of this diversity is associated with specialization for either slow, sustained movements such as maintain posture or fast but brief movements used during escape or prey capture. In invertebrates, with hydrostatic and exoskeletons, most motor neurons evoke graded depolarizations of the muscle which cause graded muscle contractions. By contrast, vertebrate motor neurons trigger action potentials in the muscle fibers which give rise to all-or-none contractions. The properties of neuromuscular transmission, in particular the intensity and persistence of transmitter release, reflect these differences. Neuromuscular transmission varies both between and within individual animals, which often have distinct tonic and phasic subsystems. Adaptive plasticity of neuromuscular transmission, on a range of time scales, occurs in many species. This article describes the main steps in neuromuscular transmission and how they vary in a number of "model" species, including C. elegans , Drosophila , zebrafish, mice, and humans. © 2024 American Physiological Society. Compr Physiol 14:5641-5702, 2024.
Author(s): Slater CR
Publication type: Review
Publication status: Published
Journal: Comprehensive Physiology
Year: 2024
Volume: 14
Issue: 4
Pages: 5641-5702
Online publication date: 09/10/2024
Acceptance date: 02/04/2018
ISSN (electronic): 2040-4603
URL: https://doi.org/10.1002/cphy.c240001
DOI: 10.1002/cphy.c240001
PubMed id: 39382166
Notes: Online ISBN: 9780470650714
