Anatomy and function
The vertebral arteries enter the cranial cavity through the skull base, ascend near the medulla and unite near the lower border of the pons to form the basilar artery.
Where to look in the model
A simplified bilateral connection into the basilar artery is shown.
What this view does not establish
The cervical portions, PICA and anterior spinal artery branches are not shown.
Open in 3DSources and precision
Cortex uses the FreeSurfer fsaverage5 template surface, with 10,242 vertices per hemisphere. Functional references use selected Destrieux sulcal and gyral parcels. Deep structures use fsaverage aseg segmentations. The Sereno2020 cerebellar research surface preserves folial geometry, but comes from another specimen; its assembled placement is schematic, without medical registration across templates. Arterial paths are manually drawn teaching schematics, not CTA/MRA reconstructions.
An educational schematic prototype for understanding spatial relationships. Item-by-item independent neuroanatomical review is pending. Functional highlights are not results of an individual examination and do not support individual diagnosis or treatment decisions.