Lateral thoracic artery at a glance
- What it is
- A branch of the axillary artery that runs along the lateral chest wall.
- Location
- It usually arises from the second part of the axillary artery and descends along the lower border of pectoralis minor, giving branches to the serratus anterior, pectoral muscles and the lateral breast.
- Function
- It supplies the pectoral muscles, serratus anterior, axillary nodes and lateral part of the breast.
- Body system
- Cardiovascular · paired (left and right)
- FMA ID
- FMA22675 (Foundational Model of Anatomy)
Key facts
- It is one of the main arteries supplying the lateral breast.
- In women it gives lateral mammary branches and is larger than in men.
Clinical relevance
It can be an important source of collateral flow around the shoulder and chest wall if the axillary artery is blocked.
Structures next to the lateral thoracic artery
The nearest named structures in the 3D model, measured from the centre of each part:
- Sternocostal part of pectoralis major · muscular
- Inferior lingular bronchial tree · respiratory
- Superior lingular bronchial tree · respiratory
- Pectoralis minor · muscular
- Pectoral branch of thoraco-acromial artery · cardiovascular
- Serratus anterior · muscular
- Fifth rib · skeletal
- Sixth rib · skeletal
- Thoracodorsal artery · cardiovascular
- Circumflex branch of coronary artery · cardiovascular
References
- Foundational Model of Anatomy: Lateral thoracic artery (FMA22675). EMBL-EBI Ontology Lookup Service.
- OpenStax. Anatomy and Physiology 2e, §20.1 Structure and Function of Blood Vessels. 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.