Final answer:
Muscle cells in this context are best referred to as muscle fibers or myocytes. Skeletal muscle fibers are unique for their long, cylindrical shape and multinucleated nature formed by the fusion of myoblasts. These fibers possess a sarcolemma, sarcoplasm, and striations due to orderly arranged fibrils.
Step-by-step explanation:
These muscle cells could be best called muscle fibers or myocytes. Skeletal muscle cells are long, cylindrical, and multi ribosomal, distinguishing them from cardiac or smooth muscle cells, which typically have a single nucleus. During development, embryonic cells known as myoblasts fuse together, each contributing its nucleus to the mature skeletal muscle fiber. This process results in the distinctive multinucleated characteristic of these cells.
The membrane surrounding each muscle fiber is known as the sarcolemma, its cytoplasm is referred to as sarcoplasm, and the specialized endoplasmic reticulum that regulates calcium ions is called the sarcoplasmic reticulum. The fibrils within the muscle fiber give it a striated appearance, which is visible under microscopes. Moreover, skeletal muscle fibers can undergo hypertrophy, an increase in size through exercise or other stimuli, or atrophy, a decrease in size due to lack of use or other factors. However, these changes in size do not affect the number of muscle fibers present.