Lateral occipital gyri
Gyri occipitales laterales
- Related terms: Middle occipital gyrus
Definition
The middle occipital gyrus is the largest gyrus of the occipital lobe. It is bounded superiorly by the intraoccipital sulcus, inferiorly by the lateral occipital sulcus and posteriorly by the lunate sulcus (and therefore does not merge in the area of the occipital pole).
It is sometimes termed (Terminologia Anatomica 2) as the “lateral occipital gyrus” because the middle occipital gyrus stretches between the superior and inferior sulci and covers the major part of the lateral surface.
In 70% of cases, this gyrus is divided by a middle occipital sulcus into a superior and inferior part.
References
Ten Donkelaar HJ, Tzourio-Mazoyer N, Mai JK. Toward a Common Terminology for the Gyri and Sulci of the Human Cerebral Cortex. Front Neuroanat. 2018 Nov 19;12:93. doi: 10.3389/fnana.2018.00093. PMID: 30510504; PMCID: PMC6252390.
Koutsarnakis, Christos & Komaitis, Spyridon & Drοsos, Evangelos & Kalyvas, Aristotelis & Skandalakis, Georgios & Liakos, Faidon & Neromyliotis, Eleftherios & Lani, Evgenia & Kalamatianos, Theodosis & Stranjalis, George. (2021). Mapping the superficial morphology of the occipital lobe: proposal of a universal nomenclature for clinical and anatomical use. Neurosurgical Review. 44. 10.1007/s10143-019-01212-2.
