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. Author manuscript; available in PMC: 2021 Feb 4.
Published in final edited form as: J Clin Neurophysiol. 1997 Jan;14(1):2–31. doi: 10.1097/00004691-199701000-00002

FIG. 6.

FIG. 6.

Course of the laterally projecting component of the spinothalamic tract in a macaque monkey. The cells of origin of the part of the spinothalamic tract that projects to the lateral thalamus are concentrated in laminae I and V of the spinal cord dorsal horn. The axons cross the midline in the ventral gray commissure at a level near that of the cell bodies of the neurons. The axons then ascend in the ventral and then in the ventrolateral quadrant. After passing through the brainstem, the axons terminate synaptically in the lateral thalamus. The nuclei of termination include the caudal part of the ventral posterior lateral nucleus (VPLc) and also the ventral posterior inferior (VPI) and the medial part of the posterior group (POm; data not shown). Some of the laterally projecting spinothalamic tract neurons send collaterals to the medial thalamus, where they end in the central lateral(CL) nucleus (dashed lines).