Cell populations in skeletal muscle after regeneration

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Abstract
Much is known of the processes involved in the regeneration of skeletal muscle after injury. Yet in most accounts, the results are expressed in general or relative terms. Thus Adams, Denny-Brown & Pearson (1962) state that provided the architecture of the muscle survives, the reconstruction of ‘considerable lengths’ of muscle fibre is feasible. Wright (1963) makes a plea for the application of quantitation, with the choice of ‘some muscle that is sufficiently small for counting and measuring techniques to be reasonably applicable…’ The web of the fruit bat Eidolon helvum (Kerr) contains a number of small muscles which have proved very suitable for the detailed study, in light and electron microscopy, of muscle regeneration (Church & Noronha, 1965; Church, Noronha & Allbrook, 1966) (Fig. 1 A–D), and for the quantitation of recovering lesions (Church, 1968). Satellite cells (Mauro, 1961), which are possibly the main source of myoblasts in regenerating muscle, have often been observed, yet again their numbers have only been expressed in general terms.