Avery Hinks
@hinksave.bsky.social
85 followers 58 following 24 posts
PhD in muscle physiology and aging, constant reader of Stephen King books
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This is a pretty cool one! We did our best to provide a comprehensive guide for our in-vivo testing protocol
Bonus: “Addition and Loss of Serial Sarcomeres—Implications for Muscle Mechanical Function” which also helped form the lit review in my thesis

Textbook chapter in “Fundamentals of Recovery, Regeneration, and Adaptation to Exercise Stress: An Integrated Approach”

link.springer.com/chapter/10.1...
Addition and Loss of Serial Sarcomeres—Implications for Muscle Mechanical Function
A skeletal muscle’s serial sarcomere number (SSN) is tightly regulated in response to chronic stimuli associated with changes in muscle length. Decreased SSN (~20%) is observed following immobil...
link.springer.com
Reposted by Avery Hinks
www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

The mechanical loading environment associated with eccentric exercise is one of the key stimuli to trigger sarcomerogenesis: It’s a stretch to say eccentric exercise does not promote serial sarcomerogenesis

Commentary on:
www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...
Reposted by Avery Hinks
Amelia was interested in how variations in sex-hormones affect the repeated bout effect following damaging eccentric exercise.

There was no difference in the response to muscle damage when females were in a low or high estradiol state.

doi.org/10.5114/biol...
Study 5: “Submaximal eccentric training during immobilization does not prevent serial sarcomere loss or impairments in mechanical function in old or young rats”

academic.oup.com/biomedgeront...
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Study 1 (under 2nd round of review currently, but here’s the pre-print): “Changes in serial sarcomere number of five hindlimb muscles across adult aging in rats”

www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...
www.biorxiv.org
Thank you so much to my supervisor @geoffpower.bsky.social, my examiners, and everyone who came out to watch and support me today!
Reposted by Avery Hinks
The PowerLab ( uofgpowerlab.weebly.com ) is having some big turnover this summer and this opens the door to take on new PhD students to work on projects related to muscular adaptations to use/disuse across various structural levels.

Happy to chat!!
My Site
About Me I am currently an Associate Professor in the Department of Human Health and Nutritional Sciences (HHNS) in the College of Biological Sciences (CBS) at the University of Guelph and Director...
uofgpowerlab.weebly.com
Great question Karyn! That definitely reflects the joint position at fixation. These aren’t the “optimal” sarcomere length but rather the sarcomere length at 90-degree joint angles, which seems to represent a different SL for the VL compared to soleus
The final piece of the puzzle for my PhD thesis, currently under review.

We looked at the trajectory of age-related serial sarcomere loss across young (8 mo), middle-aged (20 mo), old (32 mo), and very old rats (36 mo) in 5 different muscles. A simple study but it provided a lot of cool insight!
Reposted by Avery Hinks
If you are looking to run longitudinal studies (training etc) on rodents, nerve cuffs and needles may be too invasive. Here is a great alternative! And it's made of LEGO
I've had a few people over the years ask about how to build my custom-made electrode holder for in-vivo mechanical testing of the rat plantar flexors. I've now made the building instructions (including STL files for 3D-printed parts) available on Figshare: doi.org/10.6084/m9.f...
Need to shoutout @aurorascientific.bsky.social for their help during the initial piloting of this apparatus!
I've had a few people over the years ask about how to build my custom-made electrode holder for in-vivo mechanical testing of the rat plantar flexors. I've now made the building instructions (including STL files for 3D-printed parts) available on Figshare: doi.org/10.6084/m9.f...