The bilateral Left Cerebrum.Frontal Lobe.Medial Frontal Gyrus.Gray Matter.Brodmann area 6 corresponds to a portion of the medial premotor cortex, extending anterior to the primary motor cortex and involved in higher-order motor planning and preparation. Brodmann area 6 integrates multisensory and associative inputs to organize complex sequences of movements, including posture, internally generated actions, and aspects of motor imagery and attention to action. Medially, it overlaps with the supplementary motor area (SMA), which contributes to bimanual coordination, initiation of voluntary movement, and modulation of motor output to primary motor cortex and spinal circuits. This region is also implicated in aspects of executive motor control and is part of frontal cortico–basal ganglia–thalamic loops supporting goal-directed behavior. There is no direct link for Brodmann area 6 in this exact labeling; a closely related structure is the supplementary motor area: Supplementary motor area.
Brodmann area 6 in the medial frontal gyrus, encompassing premotor and supplementary motor regions, has been implicated in multiple genetic association studies, particularly in large-scale neuroimaging GWAS that relate common variants to regional gray matter volume, cortical thickness, and surface area. Variants near or within genes involved in neurodevelopment and synaptic function—such as MAPT, CNTNAP2, BDNF, and several glutamatergic and GABAergic pathway genes—have shown associations with structural or functional measures in medial frontal and premotor cortex, often overlapping with polygenic signals for general cognitive ability, educational attainment, and executive function. GWAS of psychiatric disorders including schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, major depressive disorder, autism spectrum disorder, and ADHD have repeatedly identified risk variants whose expression or imaging endophenotypes localize to medial frontal premotor regions, with altered gray matter or connectivity in BA6 observed as an intermediate phenotype. Motor-related traits and disorders, including Parkinson’s disease, dystonia, and Tourette syndrome, have also been linked to genetic variants that affect premotor/supplementary motor networks involving BA6, with imaging genetics studies showing genotype-dependent differences in activation during motor planning and sequence learning. In addition, polygenic risk scores for impulse control, risk-taking, and substance use have been associated with structural and functional variation in medial frontal BA6, suggesting that the genetic architecture of higher-order motor planning and behavioral control partly converges on this region.
Overview generated by GPT-4o (2026).
Region ID: 1009
Hemisphere: bilateral
Atlas: Talairach labels 2mm
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).