Although myostatin negatively regulates skeletal muscle growth, its function in heart is virtually unknown. Herein we demonstrate that it inhibits basal and IGF-stimulated proliferation and differentiation and also modulates cardiac excitation-contraction (EC) coupling. Loss of myostatin induced eccentric hypertrophy and enhanced cardiac responsiveness to beta-adrenergic stimulation in vivo. This was due to myostatin null ventricular myocytes having larger [Ca(2+)](i) transients and contractions and responding more strongly to beta-adrenergic stimulation than wild-type cells. Enhanced cardiac output and beta-adrenergic responsiveness of myostatin null mice was therefore due to increased SR Ca(2+) release during EC coupling and to physiological hypertrophy, but not to enhanced myofilament function as determined by simultaneous measurement of force and ATPase activity. Our studies support the novel concept that myostatin is a repressor of physiological cardiac muscle growth and function. Thus, the controlled inhibition of myostatin action could potentially help repair damaged cardiac muscle by inducing physiological hypertrophy.
This research output has an Altmetric Attention Score of 10. This is our high-level measure of the quality and quantity of online attention that it has received. This Attention Score, as well as the ranking and number of research outputs shown below, was calculated when the research output was last mentioned on 20 April 2025.
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#4,836,393
of 34,359,530 outputs
Outputs from Journal of Physiology
#1,900
of 12,240 outputs
Outputs of similar age
#19,434
of 149,884 outputs
Outputs of similar age from Journal of Physiology
#8
of 41 outputs
Altmetric has tracked 34,359,530 research outputs across all sources so far. Compared to these this one has done well and is in the 85th percentile: it's in the top 25% of all research outputs ever tracked by Altmetric.
So far Altmetric has tracked 12,240 research outputs from this source. They typically receive a lot more attention than average, with a mean Attention Score of 12.4. This one has done well, scoring higher than 84% of its peers.
Older research outputs will score higher simply because they've had more time to accumulate mentions. To account for age we can compare this Altmetric Attention Score to the 149,884 tracked outputs that were published within six weeks on either side of this one in any source. This one has done well, scoring higher than 86% of its contemporaries.
We're also able to compare this research output to 41 others from the same source and published within six weeks on either side of this one. This one has done well, scoring higher than 80% of its contemporaries.
