now i'm going to point out some of the structures that are unique to each type of vertebra so starting with the cervical vertebrae remember there are seven of those and so we can abbreviate them as c1 through c7 you'll notice that c1 and c2 are shaped very differently from all of the other cervical vertebrae pretty much c3 through c7 look very similar to each other but the first two are shaped very differently so c1 is actually called atlas because if you remember your greek mythology atlas holds the world on his shoulders up in the sky and your c1 vertebra these little flat portions these facets here these are called the superior articular facets because they're coming off the top of the vertebra and they're flat that's where you have your occipital condyles on the skull that's what will articulate with your skull so it's like that's what holds up your head just like atlas so that first one is called atlas then you'll notice that the next one c2 is also shaped very differently from the rest it has a structure that's unique to only it it has this peg that projects upward and then remember that this is the posterior side here because you can see these spinous processes so this is more anterior on the body so that is called the dens and like so it's like a peg that sticks up and allows c1 to actually rotate around it so it acts as a pivot joint so that you can actually shake your head no so c2 is called the axis because it allows c1 to rotate around it around that axis so make sure you kind of keep those two straight so dens is special to c2 so again c1 the fact that it can rotate and you can shake your head no c1 allows you to do that or sorry c2 is what allows you to do that because that's the peg sorry i know it's gonna mess that up so yeah c2 lets you rotate your head to shake your head no where c1 lets you rock your head a little bit to essentially shake your head yes it's that little rocking motion you have right up um where your skull meets your neck you can thank your atlas for that here's showing you kind of the three different variations in the shapes of the cervical vertebrae so again superior views here and then here's a lateral view as well of axis so again remember atlas is very flat and round you'll notice that c3 through ce7 look approximately like this not all of them have this split in the spinous process as you get closer to c7 for example it looks kind of more like this more like just a slender individual process but another kind of thing you can look for to tell if it's a cervical vertebrae potentially is these uh c three through almost c7 have a bifid spinous process basically just means bifurcated it's split kind of making a v shape but again not all of them have that so that's not the best thing to really try to look for what tells you that all of these are cervical vertebrae are the fact that all of them have a feature in common that no other vertebrae have so if you notice all three of these have what's called the transverse foramen or again there's more than one of them there's one on each side so it's foramina technically since you have more than one you know so there's three openings in each of these vertebrae so here's one and again you can't really see it from this view because of the superior articular facets here but notice from this lateral view you can see okay your axis has it as well so if you're ever sort of doubting okay is this a cervical vertebra look for those extra openings the transverse foramina and that will tell you that it's for sure a cervical vertebra and those openings are actually passageways for what's called your vertebral arteries so the vertebral arteries pass through the transverse foramina so again we have atlas here another thing to notice is that all vertebrae have a body except for atlas technically it just has some arches on either side so no kind of significant chunky portion of bone that we call the body is present on the atlas so that's another thing that kind of makes it unique as well remember with thoracic vertebrae we have 12 of those in total and it's not like you're gonna have to look at a vertebra and say okay well that's t8 we're not getting that specific with it you kind of want to look at what's a typical representation of each one and be able to name the specific type based off of that because you can kind of see like they're showing this picture t1 versus t12 they look pretty different from each other and when you guys look in lab at the uh for example the skeleton that we have hanging up and kind of notice how the vertebrae sort of morph into each type especially the areas where it transitions from one to another so it can be a little bit tough to tell which ones are which without them all stacked up together like they're supposed to be but you can kind of see the difference in in the shapes as you look at the various vertebrae within each category so remember when it comes to thoracic vertebrae they look like a giraffe oh and i didn't mention this previously but when it comes to cervical if you want an animal for this um we like to kind of call this the ant eater this has you know the snout that kind of comes off straight or the squirrel from ice age scrat you can do that if you want an animal shape for a cervical the typical cervical vertebra but thoracic we call that the giraffe because you can see on this one much more obviously the spinous process they tend to taper sharply downward so it's like a long snout on the giraffe the transverse processes are like the ears coming off laterally and then projecting off superiorly the horns remember this whole chunk of bone that comes off superiorly is called the superior articular process and then the flat part on it is called the superior articular facet all right remember big chunky lateral processes of the transverse processes spinous process coming off there you could also note that the opening for the spinal cord the vertebral foramen is very round and then the shape of the body here is pretty distinct as well on a thoracic vertebra remember when it comes to lumbar there's five of these in total and again kind of from the lateral view you can see that the shape kind of varies a little bit between them but they in general have very large bodies and then the spinous processes notice that they're very kind of boxy kind of rectangular in shape not like long and slender like the thoracic ones so you can kind of see that better from a view like this so this is what we call the moose because look if you look at the snout on the moose it's very kind of rectangular so again it's very blunt it's a lot shorter and rectangular in shape so that's the spinous process notice that the body of these vertebrae is very large and wide so that's also something you can kind of look for note the shape here of the actual vertebral foramen it's not like a round circle it's kind of more oval-shaped and then you see spinous process and then remember the projections that come off laterally are called the transverse processes you can kind of see it from this view but not as well notice how slender they are so those are muscle attachment sites not attachment sites for ribs you would want a more chunky solid piece of bone for your ribs to attach to for stability purposes so yeah these are not built for rib attachment that's why they're so slender and then again hard to tell from this view but then these more central pieces here that project superiorly off those are the superior articular processes that are more medial on this vertebra and so here is an image where you can kind of practice identifying each type noticing the big differences between the three major types of vertebrae and making sure you can tell what structures are what so again remember this is cervical you can tell because it's got the three openings remember the two on the lateral sides those are the transverse foramina because they are in the transverse processes so they're holes in the transverse processes remember the vertebral arteries pass through that when it comes to thoracic note the very large sizable transverse processes that the ribs would attach to so that's why those are so large no kind of the shape of the body here the vertebral foramen is very round as you kind of see with the cervical it's kind of more triangular in shape there kind of same thing for on the lumbar vertebra which is here so notice the body is very wide and then note how the transverse processes are very slender on a thoracic vertebra again from this angle you can't see the spinous processes differences as well but remember on thoracic it's a lot more slender and tends to taper sharply downwards inferiorly whereas on lumbar it's a lot shorter stubbier and more kind of rectangular as well