How Do Your Muscles and Bones Know You Have Been to the Gym? A Short Introduction to Cellular Mechanotransduction

The many benefits of physical activity are well known but the cellular mechanism leading to these physiological changes are still being revealed. The idea that mechanical signals can cause changes to the activity of biological tissues was suggested more than a century ago, and technological progress made in the past 20 years enables the testing of this hypothesis.

A growing body of evidence shows that mechanical cues transmitted from the environment to the cell or generated within the cell itself may alter its activity. These changes can be local, with proteins embedded in the plasma membrane, or be global, and affect gene expression.

Gaining understanding on cellular mechanotransduction continues to enhance our understanding of the ways physical activity affects molecular processes at the cell level and will allow adjusting training methods to various conditions such as aging, rehabilitation after injury, and more.