noun. a mass of gray matter, forming a portion of the brains’ diencephalon, whose two lobes shape the third ventricle’s walls. It contains an accumulation of autonomic, motor, sensory, and associational nuclei, functioning as a transmission for nerve impulses progressing between the spinal cord, brainstem and cerebral cortex. Particular regions of the bodily exterior and cerebral cortex correspond to particular portions of the thalamus. A multitude of structural and operative areas of the thalamus have been identified, inclusive of the ventoposterior nucleus, dorsomediae nucleus, and the lateroventrae nucleus.
THALAMUS: “The thalamus was significantly damaged in the accident.”