FIGURE 2.

Primary auditory pathway and main white matter tracts involved in auditory processing and language. (A) The relays of the auditory pathway are the cochlear nuclei, the superior olivary complex, the nuclei of the lateral lemniscus for some neurons, the inferior colliculus and the medial geniculate nucleus of the thalamus. The 8th cranial nerve finally reaches the auditory cortex in the superior temporal gyrus. The major part of the fibers from the cochlea cross the medial line at different levels of the neuraxis and arrive in contralateral auditory cortex. (B) The main intrahemispheric white matter bundles involved in auditory processing and language are the superior longitudinal fasciculus (SLF), the inferior fronto-occipital fasciculus (IFOF), and the uncinate fasciculus (UF), schematically represented here (Maffei et al., 2015).