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Upper lobe of left lung: anatomy, location and function

The upper lobe of the left lung is one of the left lung's two lobes. It lies above and in front of the oblique fissure, forms the apex of the lung and includes the lingula. Its air spaces take part in gas exchange. Air reaches it through the left upper lobe bronchus, a branch of the left main bronchus.

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Highlighted in the model: Upper lobe of left lung. Click any part to read about it, or switch off “Highlight topic” to see the whole body. Use Male / Female to switch bodies. 3D data: BodyParts3D, © The Database Center for Life Science; knee ligaments, menisci, tonsils, palate and parotid glands from the Human Reference Atlas Visible Human Male model and female parts from its Visible Human Female model (HuBMAP / NIH); lung lobes built from the BodyParts3D chest; all CC BY 4.0; meshes simplified and recoloured. The default body is an adult male.

Upper lobe of left lung at a glance

Also called
Left superior lobe
What it is
The upper lobe of the left lung is one of the left lung's two lobes. It lies above and in front of the oblique fissure, forms the apex of the lung and includes the lingula.
Location
Its apex rises above the first rib into the root of the neck. The oblique fissure separates it from the lower lobe; the fissure starts at the back between the T3 and T4 spinous processes and follows the sixth rib in front. The apex of the heart makes a deep cardiac notch in its anterior border.
Function
Its air spaces take part in gas exchange. Air reaches it through the left upper lobe bronchus, a branch of the left main bronchus.
Body system
Respiratory · left side only
FMA ID
FMA7370 (Foundational Model of Anatomy)

Key facts

  • It has four bronchopulmonary segments: apicoposterior and anterior, plus the superior and inferior lingular segments that make up the lingula.
  • The left lung has no horizontal fissure. In the basic segmental model the lingula corresponds to the right middle lobe: each has two segments.
  • The left lung is slightly smaller than the right because of the position of the heart.

Structures next to the upper lobe of left lung

The nearest named structures in the 3D model, measured from the centre of each part:

References

  1. Foundational Model of Anatomy: Upper lobe of left lung (FMA7370). EMBL-EBI Ontology Lookup Service.
  2. TeachMeAnatomy. The Lungs.
  3. Radiopaedia. Bronchopulmonary segmental anatomy.
  4. Radiopaedia. Oblique fissure.
  5. OpenStax. Anatomy and Physiology 2e, §22.1 Organs and Structures of the Respiratory System. Rice University, 2022.
  6. 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.
  7. Radiopaedia. Oblique fissure (surface anatomy used to place the oblique fissures in the 3D lungs).
  8. Radiopaedia. Horizontal fissure (surface anatomy used to place the horizontal fissure in the 3D right lung).

Related anatomy

Explore the whole body in the interactive 3D human anatomy model, or browse the A–Z list of human structures.