regular muscle-prism

plural regular muscle-prisms

1. medicineA simplified, geometric block representing a bundle of parallel muscle fibers; an old teaching model used for explaining tension, cross-sections, and electrical properties of muscle.

   ... and a muscle of regular shape, in which the fibers are parallel, is selected. The ends are cut off by clean vertical cuts, and the resulting piece of muscle is called a regular muscle prism.

   1892, William Morrant Baker, Vincent Dormer Harris, chapter XI, in Hand-book of Physiology, page 460

   2 more examples

   Taking a regularly shaped muscle in which the fibres are parallel, we will cut out a part of this by making two even cuts at right angles to the direction of the fibres. A piece of this sort may be called a regular muscle-prism. It is, according to the shape of the muscle used, either circular or more oval, or flat and band-like ... all the muscle-fibres are parallel to each other, [and] the two cuts are made at right angles to the direction of the fibres.

   1881, Rosenthal, Isidor, chapter XI, in General Physiology of Muscles and Nerves, page 189

   When the muscle is at rest the contents of the muscle prism will be in equilibrium with the surrounding sarcoplasm ... pressure in the muscle prism rises and causes a bulging of its lateral wall and a shortening of the whole element.

   1912, Starling, Ernest Henry, Principles of Human Physiology, page 264