ACTN3 - Fast Versus Slow Twitch Muscle Fibers

Fast Versus Slow Twitch Muscle Fibers

Skeletal muscle is composed of long cylindrical cells called muscle fibers. There are two types of muscle fibers, slow twitch or muscle contraction (type I) and fast twitch (type II). Slow twitch fibers are more efficient in using oxygen to generate energy whilst fast twitch fibers are less efficient. However, fast twitch fibers fire more rapidly and generate more force.These are also called the white muscle fibers and red muscles fibers respectively.

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