The bilateral Left Cerebrum.Sub-lobar.Thalamus.Gray Matter.Mammillary Body region corresponds to the paired mammillary bodies, small rounded structures on the ventral surface of the posterior hypothalamus that form part of the limbic system and the Papez circuit. Composed primarily of gray matter, they receive major input from the hippocampal formation via the fornix and project to the anterior thalamic nuclei through the mammillothalamic tract, thereby participating in episodic memory processing and spatial navigation. Lesions of the mammillary bodies, such as those associated with thiamine deficiency in Wernicke–Korsakoff syndrome, are linked to profound memory impairments and confabulation, underscoring their critical role in memory consolidation. Mammillary body
The mammillary bodies, subcortical structures in the thalamic/sub-lobar region implicated in memory circuits (particularly the Papez circuit), show genetic associations largely through imaging-genetics and GWAS of subcortical volumes and memory-related disorders rather than through region-specific GWAS alone. Large consortia such as ENIGMA and UK Biobank–based studies have identified common variants influencing thalamic and adjacent hypothalamic/mammillary region volumes, including loci near genes involved in neurodevelopment, synaptic signaling, and axonal guidance (for example, variants near KTN1, BDNF-related pathways, and other neurodevelopmental genes), though mammillary bodies are often aggregated with broader thalamic or hypothalamic measures rather than isolated as a separate target. Genetic risk for Korsakoff syndrome and Wernicke–Korsakoff spectrum (driven primarily by thiamine deficiency and alcohol-use–related genes such as ADH1B and ALDH2 in some populations) has been indirectly linked to mammillary body atrophy, while Alzheimer’s disease polygenic risk (including APOE ε4 and loci such as CLU, PICALM, and BIN1) shows associations with limbic and diencephalic atrophy patterns that often involve this region. Variants implicated in schizophrenia and bipolar disorder (for instance in CACNA1C, ZNF804A, and other synaptic/neuronal genes) have also been associated with altered thalamic and limbic volumes and connectivity in imaging-genetic analyses that encompass the mammillary bodies as part of extended thalamo-limbic circuits. Overall, current genetic findings for this specific Talairach-defined mammillary body region are indirect, emerging mainly from broader subcortical volume GWAS, limbic system imaging-genetic studies, and genetic studies of amnestic syndromes and major psychiatric and neurodegenerative disorders that exhibit structural or functional abnormalities in these nuclei.
Overview generated by GPT-4o (2026).
Region ID: 581
Hemisphere: bilateral
Atlas: Talairach labels 1mm
Full Quality Version: Download MP4
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
This resource is licensed under CC0 1.0 Universal (Public Domain).