Heart pump blood through the heart and into the major arteries. The pacemaker cells make up 1% of cells and form the conduction system of the heart. They are generally much smaller than the contractile cells and have few myofibrils which gives them limited contractibility. Their function is similar in many respects to neurons. Cardiac muscle tissue has autorhythmicity, the unique ability to initiate a cardiac action potential at a fixed rate – spreading the impulse rapidly from cell to cell to trigger the contraction of the entire heart. There are specific proteins expressed in cardiac muscle cells. These are mostly
Cardiac excitation-contraction coupling into the cell. Secondly Ca indirectly activates proteins, called myofilaments, resulting in muscle contraction. The two main myofilaments in cardiac (and skeletal) muscle are actin and myosin. Ca binds to a protein called troponin, which is bound to the actin filament. This binding causes a shape change in the troponin which exposes areas on the actin, to which the head of the myosin filament binds. The binding of the myosin head to actin is known as a cross-bridge. A molecule, called adenosine triphosphate (ATP) which is produced by an intracellular structure called a mitochondrion, is then used, as a source