The lesser petrosal nerve is the visceral motor component of the glossopharyngeal nerve (CN IX), carrying parasympathetic fibres from the tympanic plexus to the parotid gland.
After arising in the tympanic plexus, lesser petrosal nerve passes from the temporal bone into the middle cranial fossa via hiatus for lesser petrosal nerve. It travels across the floor of the middle cranial fossa, then exits the skull via foramen ovale to reach the infratemporal fossa. The fibres synapse in the otic ganglion, and post-ganglionic fibres then travel briefly with the auriculotemporal nerve (a branch of V3) before entering the body of the parotid gland.
Read more about Lesser Petrosal Nerve: See Also
Famous quotes containing the words lesser and/or nerve:
“As great minds have the faculty of saying a great deal in a few words, so lesser minds have a talent of talking much, and saying nothing.”
—François, Duc De La Rochefoucauld (1613–1680)
“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)