The internal laryngeal nerve is the internal branch (ramus internus) of the superior laryngeal nerve. It descends to the thyrohyoid membrane, pierces it in company with the superior laryngeal artery, and is distributed to the mucous membrane of the larynx.
Of these (sensory) branches some are distributed to the epiglottis, the base of the tongue, and the epiglottic glands; others pass backward, in the aryepiglottic fold, to supply the mucous membrane surrounding the entrance of the larynx, and that lining the cavity of the larynx as low down as the vocal folds.
A filament descends beneath the mucous membrane on the inner surface of the thyroid cartilage and joins the recurrent nerve.
Above the vocal folds the sensory innervation of the larynx is via the internal laryngeal nerve. Below the vocal folds it is by way of branches of the recurrent laryngeal nerve. The vocal fold itself receives dual innervation from both nerves.
Read more about Internal Laryngeal Nerve: Pathology, Additional Images
Famous quotes containing the words internal and/or nerve:
“Personal change, growth, development, identity formation—these tasks that once were thought to belong to childhood and adolescence alone now are recognized as part of adult life as well. Gone is the belief that adulthood is, or ought to be, a time of internal peace and comfort, that growing pains belong only to the young; gone the belief that these are marker events—a job, a mate, a child—through which we will pass into a life of relative ease.”
—Lillian Breslow Rubin (20th century)
“our nerve filaments twitch with its presence
day and night,
nothing we say has not the husky phlegm of it in the saying,
nothing we do has the quickness, the sureness,
the deep intelligence living at peace would have.”
—Denise Levertov (b. 1923)