The bilateral Inferior Temporal Gyrus, posterior division (from the Harvard–Oxford cortical maxprob thr25 2mm atlas) corresponds to the caudal segment of the inferior temporal gyrus, situated on the ventrolateral aspect of the temporal lobe, inferior to the middle temporal gyrus and anterior to the occipital lobe. This region participates in high-level visual processing, including object recognition and aspects of visual form and category perception, and forms part of the ventral visual stream connecting occipital visual cortices with temporal association areas. It is interconnected with fusiform and lateral occipital regions and receives input from early visual areas to support complex feature integration. There is no dedicated Wikipedia article specifically for the “Inferior Temporal Gyrus, posterior division” as defined in this atlas; a closely related structure is the inferior temporal gyrus more generally: Inferior temporal gyrus.
The bilateral inferior temporal gyrus, posterior division—corresponding to high-level visual association cortex involved in object and face processing—has been implicated in several genetic and GWAS-based associations, though typically under broader temporal or occipitotemporal measures rather than this atlas-defined parcel specifically. Large imaging-genetics consortia such as ENIGMA and UK Biobank have identified multiple common variants (e.g., near genes like KIAA0586, WNT3, HMGA2, and DPP4) associated with temporal lobe surface area, cortical thickness, and volume, which encompass the inferior temporal region. Polygenic risk scores for schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, major depressive disorder, and autism spectrum disorder have been linked to structural and functional alterations in inferior temporal and fusiform regions, especially in face and social perception networks; genes related to synaptic function (e.g., CACNA1C, GRIN2B) and neurodevelopment (e.g., CNTNAP2) frequently emerge in these networks. GWAS of cognitive traits (intelligence, educational attainment, reading and language abilities) and face recognition ability have reported associations with temporal and occipitotemporal cortex morphology, suggesting shared genetic influences on visual recognition and higher cognition. Additionally, imaging-genetics studies of neurodegenerative disorders (Alzheimer’s disease, frontotemporal dementia) show that AD-risk loci such as APOE and CLU are associated with accelerated atrophy or altered connectivity in temporal association cortex, including inferior temporal regions. While specific SNP-level associations isolated to the Harvard–Oxford inferior temporal gyrus posterior parcel are limited, converging evidence indicates that this region’s structure and function are modulated by common neurodevelopmental, synaptic, and cognitive genetic architectures identified in large-scale GWAS.
Overview generated by GPT-4o (2026).
Region ID: 15
Hemisphere: bilateral
Atlas: HarvardOxford cort maxprob thr25 2mm
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Full Quality Version: Download MP4
Wali Sidiqyar*, Gaurav Rudravaram*, Elyssa M. McMaster, Trent M. Schwartz, Adam M. Saunders, Kurt G. Schilling, Bennett A. Landman "Introducing SPINS: A Shared Public Visualization Library of Neuroanatomical Structures." Medical Imaging with Deep Learning- short paper
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