The mammalian heart pumps blood through the vessels, maintaining the dynamic equilibrium in a circulatory system driven by two pumps in series. This vital function is based on the fine-tuning of cardiac performance by the Frank-Starling mechanism that relates the pressure exerted by the contracting ventricle (end systolic pressure) to its volume (end systolic volume). At the level of the sarcomere, the structural unit of the cardiac myocytes, the Frank-Starling mechanism consists of the increase in active force with the increase of sarcomere length (length-dependent activation). We combine sarcomere mechanics and micrometer-nanometer-scale X-ray diffraction from synchrotron light in intact ventricular trabeculae from the rat to measure the axial movement of the myosin motors during the diastole-systole cycle under sarcomere length control. We find that the number of myosin motors leaving the off, ATP hydrolysis-unavailable state characteristic of the diastole is adjusted to the sarcomere length-dependent systolic force. This mechanosensing-based regulation of the thick filament makes the energetic cost of the systole rapidly tuned to the mechanical task, revealing a prime aspect of the Frank-Starling mechanism. The regulation is putatively impaired by cardiomyopathycausing mutations that affect the intramolecular and intermolecular interactions controlling the off state of the motors. myosin filament mechanosensing | heart regulation | small-angle X-ray diffraction | cardiac muscle | Frank-Starling mechanism I n each sarcomere, the structural unit of the skeletal and cardiac muscles, myosin motors arranged in antiparallel arrays in the two halves of the thick myosin-containing filament work cooperatively, generating force and shortening by cyclic ATPdriven interactions with the interdigitating thin actin-containing filaments. The textbook model for the activation of contraction indicates that the binding to actin of myosin motors from the neighboring thick filament is controlled by a calcium-dependent structural change in the thin filament. However, in these muscles at rest, most of the myosin motors are in the off state and packed into helical tracks with 43-nm periodicity on the surface of the thick filaments (1-4), making them unavailable for binding to the thin filament and ATP hydrolysis (5, 6). Recent X-ray diffraction experiments on single fibers from skeletal muscle showed that, in addition to the canonical thin filament activation system, a thick filament mechanosensing mechanism provides a way for selective unlocking of myosin motors during high load contraction (7). This thick filament-based regulation has not yet been shown in cardiac muscle, in which several regulatory systems are significant. In contrast to skeletal muscle, during heart contraction, the internal concentration of Ca 2+ ([Ca 2+ ] i ) may not reach the full activation level, and thus, the mechanical response depends on both [Ca 2+ ] i and the sensitivity of the filaments to Ca 2+ (8, 9). For a given [Ca 2+ ] i , the maximal force i...

The power in the myocardium sarcomere is generated by two bipolar arrays of the motor protein cardiac myosin II extending from the thick filament and pulling the thin, actin-containing filaments from the opposite sides of the sarcomere. Despite the interest in the definition of myosin-based cardiomyopathies, no study has yet been able to determine the mechanokinetic properties of this motor protein in situ. Sarcomere-level mechanics recorded by a striation follower is used in electrically stimulated intact ventricular trabeculae from the rat heart to determine the isotonic velocity transient following a stepwise reduction in force from the isometric peak force T P to a value T (0.8-0.2 T P ). The size and the speed of the early rapid shortening (the isotonic working stroke) increase by reducing T from ∼3 nm per half-sarcomere (hs) and 1,000 s −1 at high load to ∼8 nm·hs −1 and 6,000 s −1 at low load. Increases in sarcomere length (1.9-2.2 μm) and external [Ca 2 + ] o (1-2.5 mM), which produce an increase of T P , do not affect the dependence on T, normalized for T P , of the size and speed of the working stroke. Thus, length-and Ca 2+-dependent increase of T P and power in the heart can solely be explained by modulation of the number of myosin motors, an emergent property of their array arrangement. The motor working stroke is similar to that of skeletal muscle myosin, whereas its speed is about three times slower. A new powerful tool for investigations and therapies of myosin-based cardiomyopathies is now within our reach.cardiac myosin | myosin working stroke | heart mechanics T he performance of heart depends on the power developed by the myocardium, which in turn is strongly dependent on the end-diastolic volume modulating the systolic pressure development (Frank-Starling law of the heart). At the level of the sarcomere, the structural unit of striated muscle, the Frank-Starling law originates from the increase in the force of contraction with an increase in sarcomere length (length-dependent activation). Mutations of sarcomere proteins affect power output and are considered responsible for various forms of cardiomyopathy (1, 2). Over 250 mutations in cardiac myosin II have been reported as the cause of cardiomyopathies (1,3,4). Defining the mechanokinetic properties of the cardiac myosin in situ is therefore fundamental to understand the pathomechanisms of these cardiomyopathies and to provide previously unidentified therapeutic opportunities.In the sarcomere, the myosin motors are organized in two bipolar arrays extending from the thick filament and pulling the thin actin-containing filaments from the opposite sides of the sarcomere toward its center. In each array, the myosin motors are connected in parallel via their attachments to the thick filament and the resulting collective motor provides steady force and shortening by cyclic asynchronous ATP-driven actin-myosin interactions. Thus, the performance of the heart relies on the integration of the mechanokinetic properties of the myosin motor and the pro...

Thick filament mechanosensing has been proposed as the mechanism by which myosin motors in cardiac muscle become available to bind actin. Accordingly, Caremani et al., using x-ray diffraction from intact rat trabeculae, show that myosin motors fully return to their OFF state during diastole independently of inotropic interventions.

The skeletal muscle exhibits large functional differences depending on the myosin heavy chain (MHC) isoform expressed in its molecular motor, myosin II. The differences in the mechanical features of force generation by myosin isoforms were investigated in situ by using fast sarcomere-level mechanical methods in permeabilised fibres (sarcomere length 2.4 μm, temperature 12°C, 4% dextran T-500) from slow (soleus, containing the MHC-1 isoform) and fast (psoas, containing the MHC-2X isoform) skeletal muscle of the rabbit. The stiffness of the half-sarcomere was determined at the plateau of Ca -activated isometric contractions and in rigor and analysed with a model that accounted for the filament compliance to estimate the stiffness of the myosin motor (ε). ε was 0.56 ± 0.04 and 1.70 ± 0.37 pN nm for the slow and fast isoform, respectively, while the average strain per attached motor (s ) was similar (∼3.3 nm) in both isoforms. Consequently the force per motor (F = εs ) was three times smaller in the slow isoform than in the fast isoform (1.89 ± 0.43 versus 5.35 ± 1.51 pN). The fraction of actin-attached motors responsible for maximum isometric force at saturating Ca (T ) was 0.47 ± 0.09 in soleus fibres, 70% larger than that in psoas fibres (0.29 ± 0.08), so that F in slow fibres was decreased by only 53%. The lower stiffness and force of the slow myosin isoform open the question of the molecular basis of the higher efficiency of slow muscle with respect to fast muscle.

The mechano-kinetic properties of the cardiac myosin were studied in situ, in trabeculae dissected from the right ventricle of the rat heart, by measuring the stiffness of the half-sarcomere both at the twitch force peak (T ) of an electrically paced intact trabecula at different extracellular Ca concentrations ([Ca ] ), and in the same trabecula after skinning and induction of rigor. Taking into account the contribution of filament compliance to half-sarcomere compliance and the lattice geometry, we found that the stiffness of the cardiac myosin motor is 1.07 ± 0.09 pN nm , which is slightly larger than that of the slow myosin isoform of skeletal muscle (0.6-0.8 pN nm ) and 2- to 3-fold smaller than that of the fast skeletal muscle isoform. The increase in T from 61 ± 4 kPa to 93 ± 9 kPa, induced by raising [Ca ] from 1 to 2.5 mm at sarcomere length ∼2.2 μm, is accompanied by an increase of the half-sarcomere stiffness that is explained by an increase of the fraction of actin-attached motors from 0.08 ± 0.01 to 0.12 ± 0.02, proportional to T . Consequently, each myosin motor bears an average force of 6.14 ± 0.52 pN independently of T and [Ca ] . The application of fast sarcomere-level mechanics to intact trabeculae to define the mechano-kinetic properties of the cardiac myosin in situ represents a powerful tool for investigating cardiomyopathy-causing mutations in the myosin motor and testing specific therapeutic interventions.