Overview: The need to feed

• Food is taken in, taken apart,

and taken up in the process of
animal nutrition
• In general, animals fall into three
categories:
– Herbivores eat mainly autotrophs
(i.e., rabbits, cows, elephants,
deer)
– Carnivores eat other animals (i.e.,
sharks, hawks, spiders, snakes)
– Omnivores regularly consume
Dr. Onkar S. Bains animals as well as plants or algal
BISC 101 matter (i.e., humans, bears,
raccoons, cockroaches)
Simon Fraser University
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The main stages of food processing are ingestion,

digestion, absorption, and elimination
• Ingestion is act of eating
• Digestion is process of breaking food down into soluble
molecules - small enough to absorb
– Mechanical (physical) digestion, including chewing and churning,
increases surface area of food for faster chemical digestion
– Chemical digestion is process of enzymatic hydrolysis which splits
bonds in molecules with addition of water

• Absorption is uptake of nutrients by body cells

• Elimination is passage of undigested material out of
digestive compartment
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Organs specialized for sequential stages of food

processing form the mammalian digestive system
• Mammalian digestive system (or gastrointestinal tract)
consists of a pathway by which food enters body and solid
wastes are expelled
• Mammalian accessory glands
(salivary glands, pancreas, liver, and
gall bladder) secrete digestive juices
into gastrointestinal tract through
ducts to help breakdown food
• Food is pushed along by peristalsis,
rhythmic contractions of smooth
muscles
– Peristalsis helps in mechanical digestion
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 The oral cavity, pharynx, and esophagus
• First stage of digestion is mechanical (takes place in the oral cavity)

• Salivary glands deliver saliva to lubricate food • Swallowing causes

the epiglottis to
• Teeth chew food into smaller particles block entry to the
– This contributes to mechanical digestion, trachea
which increases the surface area to allow
for chemical digestion to occur quickly by • The esophagus
specific enzymes, namely salivary amylase (about 25 cm long)
(produced by salivary glands that initiate
carbohydrate digestion) and lingual lipase
conducts food from
(produced by cells in tongue that initiate pharynx down to
triglyceride digestion) stomach by
• Tongue shapes food into a bolus and provides help with swallowing peristalsis

• The region we call our throat is the pharynx, a junction that opens
to both the esophagus and the trachea (windpipe)
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Stomach
• The stomach has accordion-like folds and a
very elastic wall (organ can stretch to
accommodate about 2 litres of food and fluid)
• Stores food and secretes gastric juice, which
converts a meal to acidic chyme
– Gastric juice is made up of hydrochloric acid and
the enzyme pepsin

• Coordinated contraction and relaxation of

stomach smooth muscle churn the stomach’s
contents
Gastric rugae are a series of
– Churning mixes and breaks down food (a type of ridges produced by folding in the
mechanical digestion) stomach

When food enters, these rugae

• Sphincters prevent chyme from entering the unfold and become stretched
esophagus and regulate its entry into the (thereby expanding the
small intestine stomach)
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• Parietal cells secrete hydrogen (H+) and chloride (Cl-) ions, separately
Digestion in the small intestine
• Chief cells secrete inactive pepsinogen, which is activated to pepsin
when mixed with hydrochloric acid in the stomach
• The small intestine is longest
• Mucous cells (or goblet cells) secretes mucus, which protects stomach section of the alimentary canal
lining from gastric juice (also known as gastrointestinal
tract) [it is over 6 meters (20 feet)
Besides
long in humans]
activating
pepsinogen
• It is the major organ of digestion
into pepsin, and absorption
HCl also kills
invading • The first portion of the small
bacteria intestine is the duodenum,
where chyme from the stomach
mixes with digestive juices from
the pancreas, liver, gallbladder,
and the small intestine itself
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 Enzymatic hydrolysis in the human digestive system
Pancreatic secretions Cells in tongue release
lingual lipases to
• The pancreas secretes zymogens (also known as pro-enzymes) enzymatically breakdown
triglycerides
partly to prevent the enzymes from digesting the cells in which they
Gastric chief cells of
are synthesized stomach also release
gastric lipases

‒ Zymogens or pro-enzymes are dormant (non-functional) enzyme precursors

• The pro-enzymes are normally activated after entering the

duodenum…some of them include:
‒ Trypsinogen and chymotrypsinogen = activated into trypsin and
chymotrypsin (enzymatically breaks down small polypeptides)
‒ Procarboxypeptidase = activated into carboxypeptidase (enzymatically
breaks down smaller polypeptides)
‒ Prolipase = activated into lipase (enzymatically breaks down fats)
‒ Proamylase and pronucleases

• Secretions are alkaline as a result of HCO3- ions (bicarbonate) which

is used
Copyright to neutralize
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Benjamin Cummings

Bile production by the liver

• In small intestine, bile aids in
Gastric
lipase
digestion and absorption of fats
• Bile is made in liver and stored in
gall bladder
• Bile emulsifies fat
• This is a type of mechanical digestion
– Emulsification: transformation of large
lipid droplets into small lipid droplets

• Emulsification increases surface area

for chemical digestion of fats by
lipases
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• Besides bile production, the liver has a number of

functions:
– Detoxifies the blood to rid it of harmful
substances such as alcohol and drugs
– Stores some vitamins and iron
– Stores the simple sugar glucose as
glycogen
– Converts glycogen to usable sugar
when the body’s sugar (glucose) levels
fall below normal
– Breaks down hemoglobin as well as
insulin and other hormones
– Converts ammonia to urea

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– Destroys old red blood cells
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 Absorption in the small intestine – villi and microvilli • Each villus contains a network of
• The small intestine has villi and microvilli that increase the blood vessels and a small
surface area for absorption (villi and microvilli are exposed to lymphatic vessel called a lacteal
intestinal lumen = space / cavity) • Glycerol and fatty acids are
• Enormous microvillar surface area greatly increases rate of absorbed by epithelial cells and
nutrient absorption are recombined into fats
• These fats are coated with
phospholipids, cholesterol, and
proteins to form chylomicrons
– Chylomicrons are transported
into a lacteal, a lymphatic vessel
in each villus

• Amino acids and sugars pass

through the epithelium of the
small intestine and enter the
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• Capillaries and veins from the lacteals in small intestine (along Absorption in the large intestine
with blood vessels leaving large intestine, stomach and spleen) all
• The colon or large intestine
converge to form the hepatic portal vein, which delivers blood to
[1.5 meters long in humans] is
the liver and then on to the heart
connected to the small intestine
• The cecum aids in the fermentation
of plant material and connects
where the small and large
intestines meet
• The human cecum has an
extension called the appendix,
which plays a very minor role in
immunity
• A major function is water
reabsorption, recovering water that
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publishing as Pearson Benjamin Cummings

Regulation of digestion by specific hormones

• Another major function is the
reabsorption of mineral ions • Each step in the digestive system is activated as needed
such as sodium and chlorine
• As food arrives in stomach, it stretches the stomach walls,
• Wastes of the digestive tract, triggering release of the hormone gastrin
the feces, become more solid • Gastrin circulates in bloodstream back to stomach, where it
as they move through the stimulates production of gastric juices
colon and are temporarily
stored in the rectum until their
elimination from the body
• The colon houses strains of the
bacterium Escherichia coli,
some of which produce
vitamins (i.e., vitamin K, biotin
Hormones are chemical signals
and folic acid) which are
that travel in bloodstream to
reabsorbed into bloodstream
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affect function of a target organ
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 • Secretin triggers pancreas to secrete
• Chyme (an acidic mixture of
HCO3- ions into duodenum so that
partially digested food) eventually
chyme is neutralized
passes from the stomach to the
duodenum • If chyme is rich in fats, the high levels of
secretin and CCK released act on
• This triggers cells lining the wall of
stomach to inhibit peristalsis and
duodenum to release the
secretion of gastric juices, thereby
hormones cholecystokinin (CCK)
slowing digestion
and secretin into the bloodstream
• CCK triggers:
– the gallbladder to contract so that
bile can be released into the
duodenum via bile duct
– the pancreas to secrete digestive
pancreatic juices into duodenum
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Glucose homeostasis
• The hormones insulin and glucagon regulate the breakdown of
glycogen into glucose
• Liver is the primary site for glucose homeostasis
– A carbohydrate-rich meal raises insulin levels, which triggers the
synthesis of glycogen
– Low blood sugar causes
glucagon to stimulate
the breakdown of
glycogen and release
glucose

In pancreas, beta cells

produce insulin while alpha
cells© 2008
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