Inferior temporal gyrus at a glance
- What it is
- The inferior temporal gyrus is the lowest gyrus on the lateral surface of the temporal lobe.
- Location
- It lies below the inferior temporal sulcus, extending onto the inferior surface of the temporal lobe.
- Function
- It is part of the ventral visual stream and is involved in visual object recognition and in some aspects of semantic processing.
- Body system
- Nervous · paired (left and right)
- FMA ID
- FMA72688 (Foundational Model of Anatomy)
Key facts
- Lies lateral to the fusiform gyrus.
- It lies above the tentorium cerebelli and the floor of the middle cranial fossa.
- It is supplied by the middle cerebral artery laterally and the posterior cerebral artery on its inferior surface.
Clinical relevance
Damage to the inferior temporal cortex can impair recognition of objects despite intact vision (visual agnosia).
Structures next to the inferior temporal gyrus
The nearest named structures in the 3D model, measured from the centre of each part:
- Fusiform gyrus · nervous
- Temporal bone · skeletal
- Hippocampus · nervous
- Parahippocampal gyrus · nervous
- Lateral geniculate body · nervous
- Anterior choroidal artery · cardiovascular
- Tentorium cerebelli · nervous
- Medial geniculate body · nervous
- Postcommunicating part of posterior cerebral artery · cardiovascular
- Amygdala · nervous
References
- Foundational Model of Anatomy: Inferior temporal gyrus (FMA72688). EMBL-EBI Ontology Lookup Service.
- OpenStax. Anatomy and Physiology 2e, §12.1 Basic Structure and Function of the Nervous 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.