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Anatomy of the Human Visual Pathway

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Homonymous Visual Field Defects

Abstract

Vision is the primary sense in humans. There are approximately one million axons in the optic nerve, constituting almost 40% of the total number of axons in all cranial nerves. The primary sensors for sight are the 130 million rods and seven million cones found in the retina. With the release of glutamate, they transform electromagnetic waves of light with a wavelength between 400 and 700 nm to graded changes of the membrane potential. The signal from photoreceptors continues to the bipolar cells and then to the retinal ganglion cells. Their axons pass through the optic nerve, the optic chiasm, form the optic tract, and reach the lateral geniculate body of the thalamus. The axons coming from the nasal hemiretina are crossed in the optic chiasm, while axons from the temporal hemiretina stay uncrossed. Neurons of the lateral geniculate body send their axons to the optic radiation and terminate in the primary visual cortex – the striate area in the ipsilateral occipital lobe where the first analysis of visual information is performed. Further processing takes place in extrastriate visual areas in the occipital, parietal, and temporal lobes. The visual pathway shows a precise retinotopical organization at all levels that gives the anatomical background for symptoms when some part of optic pathway is damaged.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Anatomy, Division of Neuroanatomy, Faculty of Medicine, Masaryk University, 625 00, Brno, Czech Republic

    Marek Joukal MD, PhD

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  1. Marek Joukal MD, PhD
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Correspondence to Marek Joukal MD, PhD .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Ophthalmology and Optometry, St. Anne’s University Hospital, Brno, Czech Republic

    Karolína Skorkovská

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Joukal, M. (2017). Anatomy of the Human Visual Pathway. In: Skorkovská, K. (eds) Homonymous Visual Field Defects. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-52284-5_1

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-52284-5_1

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  • Publisher Name: Springer, Cham

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-319-52282-1

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-319-52284-5

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