Soft palate

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The soft palate (or velum, or muscular palate) is the soft tissue constituting the back of the roof of the mouth. The soft palate is distinguished from the hard palate at the front of the mouth in that it does not contain bone.

It is movable, consisting of muscle fibers sheathed in mucous membrane, and is responsible for closing off the nasal passages during the act of swallowing.

The soft palate’s motion during breathing is responsible for the sound of snoring. Touching the soft palate evokes a strong gag response in most people.

The soft palate also functions during speech to separate the oral cavity (mouth) from the nose, in order to produce the oral speech sounds. If this separation is incomplete, air escapes through the nose during speech and the speech is perceived as hypernasal.

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  Soft palate without tonsils (after tonsillectomy)
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  Mouth (oral cavity)
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  Mouth
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  Sagittal section of nose mouth, pharynx, and larynx.
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  The mouth cavity. The cheeks have been slit transversely and the tongue pulled forward.

• Hard palate
• Palate
• Tonsil
• Palatine uvula

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• Image at WebMD
• Template:SUNYAnatomyFigs – “Diagram of the regions of the oral cavity.”
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