title: Variation in daily masticatory muscle activity in the rabbit.
abstract: The daily use of masticatory muscles remains largely unclear, since continuous recordings were limited in space and time. This study's purpose was to use radio-telemetry to examine daily muscle use and its inter- and intra-individual variations. A telemetric device was implanted into the rabbit masseter, and the transmitted signals were digitally stored for 7 days. Muscle use was analyzed by calculation of the total time each muscle was activated above 5, 20, and 50% of the day's peak activity. Rabbits (n = 6) spent only 2% of the time chewing. Muscles were activated up to 20% of the total time at levels exceeding 5% of peak activity, and only about 0.5% of the time in forceful behaviors utilizing 50% of maximum contraction. It can be concluded that daily muscle use remained constant during succeeding days, but differed significantly among muscle regions and individuals.
authors.affiliation: Department of Functional Anatomy, Academic Center for Dentistry Amsterdam, Meibergdreef 15, 1105 AZ Amsterdam, The Netherlands.
authors.forename: G E J
authors.initials: GE
authors.lastname: Langenbach
authors.forename: T
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: van Wessel
authors.forename: P
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Brugman
authors.forename: T M G J
authors.initials: TM
authors.lastname: van Eijden
mesh_terms: D000704:Analysis of Variance; D000818:Animals; D002940:Circadian Rhythm / Q000502:physiology*; D004326:Drinking / Q000502:physiology; D004567:Electrodes, Implanted; D004576:Electromyography; D005071:Evoked Potentials / Q000502:physiology; D008297:Male; D008406:Masseter Muscle / Q000502:physiology*; D008409:Mastication / Q000502:physiology; D016555:Matched-Pair Analysis; D009119:Muscle Contraction / Q000502:physiology; D011817:Rabbits; D012815:Signal Processing, Computer-Assisted; D013686:Telemetry / Q000295:instrumentation; D013997:Time Factors; D014743:Videotape Recording