Lateral geniculate body at a glance
- What it is
- The lateral geniculate body is the thalamic relay nucleus for vision.
- Location
- It is a small elevation on the posterior-inferior thalamus, lateral to the medial geniculate body.
- Function
- It receives retinal input via the optic tract and relays it to the primary visual cortex through the optic radiation.
- Body system
- Nervous · paired (left and right)
- FMA ID
- FMA73304 (Foundational Model of Anatomy)
Key facts
- Has six layers; layers 1, 4 and 6 receive contralateral eye fibres, and layers 2, 3 and 5 ipsilateral.
- Blood supply from the anterior and lateral posterior choroidal arteries.
Clinical relevance
Lesions cause a contralateral homonymous visual field defect.
Structures next to the lateral geniculate body
The nearest named structures in the 3D model, measured from the centre of each part:
- Medial geniculate body · nervous
- Hippocampus · nervous
- Parahippocampal gyrus · nervous
- Anterior choroidal artery · cardiovascular
- Postcommunicating part of posterior cerebral artery · cardiovascular
- Fusiform gyrus · nervous
- Fornix of forebrain · nervous
- Brachium of inferior colliculus · nervous
- Lateral ventricle · nervous
- Optic tract · nervous
References
- Foundational Model of Anatomy: Lateral geniculate body (FMA73304). 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.
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