How Muscles Grow in Human Body

Okay, let’s do it! Bend down, hold up, and use your muscles to lift that 30 kg luggage. This task or every single movement of your body triggers your muscles to accomplish the orders sent from your brain. Muscles play an important role in our performance. According to an article from Team Singapore (2017), sturdy muscles not only make our daily activities easier, but also prevent us from many types of injuries by fortifying the bones and tendons. As a result, that muscles are strong enough influences us largely. But, how do muscles grow? Muscles, or be more specific, skeleton muscles, which are attached to bones for managing the work in actions, develop through three progressive steps.

The first stage for the development of muscles lies in the exposure to more tension. All movements of our bodies are in the control of our brains. After receiving the message from the brain, muscles in different parts cooperate with the others by contracting or relaxing to accomplish the action that the brain orders. Because our muscles have got used to the strength everyday activities take, one who desires to have strong muscles is requested to do more intensive exercise or load more weight than usual. During this additional “suffering”, your muscles are going to move to the next stage ─being injured (See Pic1).

Pic1. The First Two Stages of the Growth of Muscles ─ Tension and Damage

The next phase in the process of developing muscles is to damage them (See Pic1). When people give extra stress to their muscles, they will undergo microscopic damage, which, in this case, has a positive consequence. Muscles actually consist of muscle fibers, which are the individual units within the muscle (See Pic 2). And, the components of muscle fibers are myofibrils or myosatellite cells, which are the smallest entities in muscles. Due to the additional pressure, these myofibrils are damaged and then they will release the molecules, which are called cytokines, which is like a signal to call for a rescue. Later on, the rescue is coming, which means the process of the growth of muscles transfers to the last phase ─ repair.

Pic 2. Muscles and Their Units

Finally, the sequence of muscle growing comes to the last stage, which is to repair from the damage (See Pic3). After muscle cells experience the microtrauma in the second stage, the “doctors” from the immune system would be sent to repair the injured cells. The damaged tissues emit cytokines, which trigger the immune system to mend the injured myofibrils. In the immune system, the repairman or the doctor in charge of this task is named robust and it can arrange amino acids what proteins are made up to fill into the fractures in damaged cells. Therefore, through the healing process, muscle fibers get bonus nutrients which are amino acids and are able to expand in width. Besides, this kind of repair system works better when we take a rest or sleep.

Pic3. The Last Stage of the Growth of Muscles ─ Repair

In conclusion, the progression of the growth of skeleton muscles is to repeat the three mentioned stages: having your muscles experience tensions, injuries and repairs. Although the development of muscles undergoes in the cell scale, the distinction between strong and withered muscles would be demonstrated in your daily performance. For instance, not everyone can lift up a 30kg suitcase easily. Thus, making your muscles strong enough to face different tasks is crucial.

References:

1.How Exactly Do Muscles Grow by Ashish (2016). Retrieved from https://www.scienceabc.com/pure-sciences/how-exactly-do-muscles-grow.html

2. When you are lifting, how does it make your muscle strong? When you put steroids in your body, how does it affect your body by the University of California, Santa Barbara (2017). Retrieved from http://scienceline.ucsb.edu/getkey.php?key=406

3.What makes muscles grow by Jeffrey Siegel / Ted-Ed (2015). Retrieved from https://www.ted.com/talks/jeffrey_siegel_what_makes_muscles_grow/transcript

4. WIKIPEDIA. Retrieved from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muscle_hypertrophy

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6.How You Can Use Hypertrophy to Grow Your Muscles by Dr. Rachel Tavel (2018). Retrieved from https://www.menshealth.com/fitness/a25252586/muscle-hypertrophy/

7. 5 reasons why you should build muscle by Jack Costello (2017). Retrieved from https://www.myactivesg.com/read/2017/10/5-reasons-why-you-should-build-muscle

8. Pic1. & Pic3. Retrieved from https://www.quora.com/How-can-I-trick-my-muscles-to-grow-bigger

9. Pic2. Retrieved from https://www.anatomyrehab.ae/relationship-between-muscle-growth-and-strength/?fbclid=IwAR1dbZSS94ag0-cqqjcO2PP2eOWEOQzlHOoZLecJOOAJoTRfDsLjWhcxY0o

10.GIF by Petter Pentilä Retrieved from https://giphy.com/gifs/tomato-carrot-broccoli-4bjIKBOWUnVPICCzJc