Striated Muscles

contractile tissue consisting, unlike smooth muscle, of symplasms, or multinuclear muscle fibers covered by a thin membrane, the sarcolemma.

Striated muscles have transverse striation caused by the alternation in their myofibrils of portions with different physicochemical and optical properties. Striated muscles make up the skeletal (truncal, or somatic) musculature and certain other muscles in vertebrates. Among invertebrates, striated muscles are found chiefly in arthropods. The main function of striated muscles is to move the body or its individual parts in space.