Epiglottis at a glance
- What it is
- The epiglottis is a leaf-shaped elastic cartilage that covers the laryngeal inlet during swallowing.
- Location
- It lies behind the root of the tongue and the hyoid bone, attached by its stalk to the inner thyroid cartilage.
- Function
- It folds back over the laryngeal inlet during swallowing to direct food into the esophagus and prevent aspiration.
- Body system
- Respiratory · single, midline structure
- FMA ID
- FMA55130 (Foundational Model of Anatomy)
Key facts
- Made of elastic cartilage covered by mucosa.
- Attached to hyoid by hyo-epiglottic ligament and to thyroid cartilage by thyro-epiglottic ligament.
Clinical relevance
Epiglottitis is an infection that can rapidly obstruct the airway.
Structures next to the epiglottis
The nearest named structures in the 3D model, measured from the centre of each part:
- Hyo-epiglottic ligament · respiratory
- Hyoid bone · skeletal
- Thyro-arytenoid · muscular
- Thyrohyoid membrane · respiratory
- Median thyrohyoid ligament · respiratory
- Thyroid cartilage · respiratory
- Cuneiform cartilage · respiratory
- Thyrohyoid · respiratory
- Thyro-epiglottic ligament · respiratory
- Palatopharyngeus · muscular
References
- Foundational Model of Anatomy: Epiglottis (FMA55130). EMBL-EBI Ontology Lookup Service.
- OpenStax. Anatomy and Physiology 2e, §22.1 Organs and Structures of the Respiratory System. Rice University, 2022.
- Mitsuhashi N. et al. (2009). BodyParts3D: 3D structure database for anatomical concepts. Nucleic Acids Research 37, D782–D785. Data © The Database Center for Life Science, CC BY 4.0.
Related anatomy
Explore the whole body in the interactive 3D human anatomy model, or browse the A–Z list of human structures.