Corpus: Mandibular canal

The mandibular canal is a bony canal in the lower jaw bone in which the inferior alveolar nerve and its accompanying blood vessels run.

The inferior alveolar nerve and the inferior alveolar artery and vein enter the mandibular canal in the mandibular foramen. In the region of the mandibular ramus, the canal first runs obliquely caudally and frontally, then almost horizontally forwards in the corpus mandibulae.

The mandibular canal lies directly under the alveoli, with which it communicates through small openings. Once it reaches the premolars, it ends again on the bone surface in the mental foramen and before that it gives off two small canals to the alveoli of the incisors. In the posterior 2/3 of the mandible, the canal lies closer to the inner surface (facies interna) of the bone, in the anterior third closer to the outer surface (facies externa).