 Hey everybody, Dr. O here. So I already covered what a typical vertebrae looks like. Now I want to compare cervical, thoracic, and lumbar vertebrae, at least to the level you need to know it. So the first two things I look at are the shape of the vertebral body and the shape of the vertebral foramen, where the spinal cord would be. So with a cervical vertebrae, I see a rectangular vertebral body. With a thoracic vertebrae, I see a heart shaped vertebral body. And then with a lumbar vertebrae, I think it's a kidney being shaped vertebral body. And here on the left again, with a cervical vertebrae, the vertebral triangle, vertebral foramen is a triangle. With the thoracic vertebrae, it's more oval, more of a circle. And then with a lumbar vertebrae, it's going to be a triangle again. So here you see your cervical vertebrae. There are seven of them. They're just going to be named C1 to C7, but you'll see that C1 and C2 do have their own special names. So C1 is called the atlas, and that's because like with Greek mythology, atlas holding the heavens. So just like C1 is holding your skull. And then C2 is called the axis, because it's the axis point for rotation of your cervical spine. So you see the seven vertebrae there? The spinous processes of cervical vertebrae are usually biped, split like that, like a snake's tongue. That's because there's so many little muscles that attach here. It just has more surface area for muscle attachment. With the rest of your vertebrae, you're just going to see a single spinous process. The spinous processes of C3 to C6 are actually pretty short, making C7 look even bigger. So C7 is called vertebra prominence because of the size of that spinous process there. What else? The transverse process of your cervical vertebrae is also unique because of that opening, the hole called the transverse foramen. I like to call it the transverse foramina. That's going to be where the vertebral artery runs up to your head. So your thoracic and lumbar vertebrae do not have that foramen, that opening. So C1 doesn't actually have a vertebral body. It just has an anterior and posterior arch. It looks a lot different there. So C1 is going to be what's supporting your skull. And then C2 has this special process, odontoid process or dens that pops up. And that actually, so that's where C1 will spin around. Let me show you the joint. It's called the atlantoaxial joint. So the dens of C2 pops up and then C1 is wrapped around it. And then this transverse ligament holds it in place. That's going to be where a bunch of rotation in your neck takes place. So that's all you have to know about the cervical vertebrae, thoracic vertebrae even less. So you have 12 thoracic vertebrae because they have ribs attached to them. That's why there's 12 of them. The vertebral bodies of thoracic vertebrae are going to be bigger than the cervical vertebrae because they're supporting more weight. We already said the body would be heart shaped and the vertebral foramen would be a circle. The key thing to note with your thoracic vertebrae, the key things I see, the spinous processes, they actually point down. So if you're touching a spinous process, it's of the vertebrae above where you would be at. The other thing that's interesting about thoracic vertebrae is they have these extra facets on the side where your ribs would be attached. And here you see with a rib attached. So it takes, there's two attachment points for each rib, one where the head attached and one where the tubercle of the rib would attach. So they're going to have these extra facets, these flat joints that allow your ribs to attach there. So 12 pairs of ribs, 12 thoracic vertebrae. Lumbar vertebrae, there are five of them. They're going to have a larger kidney bean shaped vertebral body and then a triangle vertebral foramen there. Everything about them is big because they're supporting more weight. You can see that the facets joints there, how they line up, they actually are the articulating processes there. They allow for a lot of flexion and extension. So your low back is designed for flexion and extension, whereas your cervical spine will be designed for more of rotation. All right, so that's actually it. That's just the typical vertebrae in each area and hope that kind of clarifies any confusion about what makes each type of vertebrae different or unique. Hope this helps. Have a wonderful day. Be blessed.