tongue
Lingua
In 5 atlases
Key points
- The tongue is a muscular organ in the floor of the mouth, with a posterior part that extends into the throat.
- Its upper surface bears papillae, while its muscles change its shape and position during eating, swallowing and speech.
- The lingual artery provides its main blood supply, and lymph drains to nodes beneath the chin, beneath the jaw and along the deep neck.
- Most tongue muscles receive motor supply from the hypoglossal nerve (XII), while sensation and taste travel through other cranial nerves.
Definition
A muscular organ in the floor of the mouth.
Source: UBERON · Licence: CC-BY-3.0
Definition from the Uberon multi-species anatomy ontology (Mungall CJ et al., Genome Biology 2012, 13:R5), https://obophenotype.github.io/uberon/, licensed under CC BY 3.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/).
Relations
- Innervation
- hypoglossal nerve (XII), glossopharyngeal nerve (IX)
- Arterial supply
- lingual artery, ascending pharyngeal artery
- Venous drainage
- lingual vein
Sub-structures
Neighbouring structures
Practice questions
Read more
Identifiers
- TA2
- 2820
- TA98
- A05.1.04.001
- FMA
- 54640
- UBERON
- 0001723
- Wikidata
- Q9614