Lever Systems: Bone-Muscle Relationships

How do our bones and muscles work? What makes movement possible? These are just a few questions you may find yourself thinking about now and again, and although these questions cant be answered in a single article, we can tackle the idea of leverage and bone-muscle relationships. In this article well discuss mechanical advantage, mechanical disadvantage, the idea of a lever, fulcrum, effort, and load, classes of levers, and lever systems within the human body.

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How do muscles work? Picture a hand-woven quilt full of strong fibers that have different shapes, sizes, and elasticities. The fibers may converge toward a single point, or run parallel with other muscles. Maybe theyre circular (like the muscle fibers around your mouth and eyes), and attach obliquely. In short, the arrangement of a muscles fiber bundles (fascicles) determines its range of motion and power. In this article well discuss fiber arrangements and muscle mechanics.

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The human skeleton contains 206 known bones and because of its sheer scope, a classification system had to be invented. Typically, bones are classified into four categories by shape: long, short, flat, and irregular. The skeleton is again classified into smaller and more specific groups which well discuss in future publications. The seven functions of bone: support, protection, movement, mineral storage, cell formation, fat storage, and hormone production are briefly discussed as well.

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