Left Putamen

Overview

The bilateral Left Putamen, as defined in the Harvard-Oxford subcortical maxprob thr25 1mm atlas, is a paired deep gray matter structure within the dorsal striatum of the basal ganglia, situated lateral to the globus pallidus and medial to the insular cortex. Composed predominantly of medium spiny GABAergic neurons, it receives dense excitatory glutamatergic inputs from motor, premotor, associative, and limbic cortical areas, as well as dopaminergic projections from the substantia nigra pars compacta. Functionally, the putamen is critically involved in motor planning, execution, and habit learning, integrating sensorimotor and associative information to modulate thalamocortical circuits and facilitate appropriate movement selection while suppressing competing motor programs. It also contributes to procedural learning, reinforcement-based action selection, and aspects of cognitive and emotional processing through its participation in cortico-striato-thalamo-cortical loops. There is no direct Wikipedia article for “Left Putamen,” but the region is described under the general putamen entry: Putamen.

The bilateral left putamen, as defined in the Harvard-Oxford subcortical atlas, has been strongly implicated in genetic studies of neuropsychiatric and neurodegenerative traits, particularly through GWAS of brain structure and function. Variants in genes such as DRD2, ANKK1, and other dopaminergic pathway genes have been associated with putamen volume and activity, linking this region to disorders involving reward processing, motor function, and habit learning, including schizophrenia, major depressive disorder, and substance use disorders (notably alcohol, nicotine, and stimulant dependence). Large-scale imaging-genetics consortia (e.g., ENIGMA, UK Biobank studies) have identified polygenic influences on putamen volume and connectivity, implicating loci related to synaptic function, neurodevelopment, and myelination, while GWAS of Parkinson’s disease and other movement disorders highlight genetic overlap between risk loci (such as those near SNCA, LRRK2, and MAPT) and structural or functional variation in the striatum, including the putamen. Additional associations link putaminal measures to cognitive traits (e.g., intelligence, processing speed), obsessive-compulsive and tic disorders, and metabolic traits (such as BMI and diabetes risk), suggesting that genetically influenced variation in the putamen contributes to a broad spectrum of behavioral, cognitive, and motor phenotypes.

Overview generated by GPT-4o (2026).

Region ID: 6
Hemisphere: bilateral
Atlas: HarvardOxford sub maxprob thr25 1mm

Left Putamen – Black Background (Full Brain)

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Left Putamen – White Background (Full Brain)

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Triplanar View – T1 Background

Triplanar View – Ghost Brain