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The anterior auricular muscle, the smallest of the three auricular muscles, is thin and fan-shaped, and its fibers are pale and indistinct. It arises from the lateral edge of the epicranial aponeurosis , and its fibers converge to be inserted into a projection on the front of the helix .
The extrinsic auricular muscles are the three muscles surrounding the auricula or outer ear: anterior auricular muscle; superior auricular muscle; posterior auricular muscle; The superior muscle is the largest of the three, followed by the posterior and the anterior. In some mammals these muscles can adjust the direction of the pinna.
It merges with the occipitofrontalis muscle. In front, it forms a short and narrow prolongation between its union with the frontalis muscle (the frontal part of the occipitofrontalis muscle). On either side, the epicranial aponeurosis attaches to the anterior auricular muscles and the superior auricular muscles.
The function of the muscle is to adjust the shape of the ear by depressing the anterior margin of the ear cartilage. While the muscle modifies the auricular shape only minimally in the majority of individuals, this action could increase the opening into the external acoustic meatus in some.
The great auricular nerve is a large trunk that ascends almost vertically over the sternocleidomastoid. [2] It winds around the posterior border of the sternocleidomastoid muscle, then perforates the deep fascia before ascending alongside the external jugular vein upon that sternocleidomastoid muscle beneath the platysma muscle to the parotid gland. [1]
The maxillary artery, the larger of the two terminal branches of the external carotid artery, arises behind the neck of the mandible, and is at first imbedded in the substance of the parotid gland; it passes forward between the ramus of the mandible and the sphenomandibular ligament, and then runs, either superficial or deep to the lateral pterygoid muscle, to the pterygopalatine fossa.
The mastoid lymph nodes (retroauricular lymph nodes or posterior auricular glands) are a small group of lymph nodes, usually two in number, located just beneath the ear, on the mastoid insertion of the sternocleidomastoideus muscle, beneath the posterior auricular muscle.
The nerve passes deep to the neck of the mandible [1] - between it and the sphenomandibular ligament [2]: 364 - and then courses deep to the lateral pterygoid muscle. [1] It issues parotid branches and then turns superiorly, posterior to its head and moving anteriorly, gives off anterior branches to the auricle .