Vertebral artery at a glance
- What it is
- A branch of the subclavian artery supplying the brain and spinal cord.
- Location
- It arises from the first part of the subclavian artery, usually enters the transverse foramen of C6 (about 90 percent), ascends through C6–C1, enters the skull through the foramen magnum and joins its partner at the lower pons to form the basilar artery.
- Function
- It supplies the brainstem, cerebellum and posterior brain.
- Body system
- Cardiovascular · paired (left and right)
- FMA ID
- FMA3958 (Foundational Model of Anatomy)
Key facts
- It is divided into four parts (V1–V4).
- The left vertebral artery arises directly from the aortic arch in about 5 percent.
- Together with the basilar artery, the vertebral arteries form the posterior (vertebrobasilar) circulation, which carries roughly a fifth of the brain's blood flow.
Clinical relevance
Dissection can cause stroke.
Structures next to the vertebral artery
The nearest named structures in the 3D model, measured from the centre of each part:
- Superior oblique part of longus colli · muscular
- Intervertebral disk of axis · skeletal
- Longus capitis · muscular
- Obliquus capitis inferior · muscular
- Axis · skeletal
- Stylopharyngeus · muscular
- Atlas · skeletal
- Pharyngeal raphe · digestive
- Third cervical vertebra · skeletal
- Intervertebral disk of third cervical vertebra · skeletal
References
- Foundational Model of Anatomy: Vertebral artery (FMA3958). 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.