Bilateral cingulotomy
Studies in patients that were a subject to bilateral cingulotomy, that involved fMRI analyses, showed that the anterior cingulate cortex has a key role in cognitive control and is highly likely to be involved in the control of attentional response, whereas the dorsal part of that region of the brain was not identified to be involved in such a process, although this is still under dispute. The function of the dorsal part of the cingulate cortex was connected to the sorting out and processing of conflicting information signals. In addition, neuroimaging studies also indicated that the anterior cingulate cortex participates in the modulation of cortical regions that are of higher order as well as sensory processing areas.
Cingulate cortex
A retrograde tracing experiment on macaque monkeys revealed that the ventral anterior nucleus (VA) and the ventral lateral nucleus (VL) of the thalamus are connected with motor areas of the cingulate sulcus. The retrosplenial region (Brodmann's area 26, 29 and 30) of cingulate gyrus can be divided into three parts: "i.e.", retrosplenial granular cortex A, retrosplenial granular cortex B and retrosplenial dysgranular cortex. The hippocampal formation sends dense projections to retrosplenial granular cortex A and B and fewer projections to the retrosplenial dysgranular cortex. The postsubiculum sends projections to retrosplenial granular cortex A and B and to the retrosplenial dysgranular cortex. The dorsal subiculum sends projections to retrosplenial granular cortex B, while ventral subiculum sends projections to retrosplenial granular cortex A. Entorhinal cortex – caudal parts – sends projections to the retrosplenial dysgranular cortex.