Questions tagged [digestive-system]
Organs that play a role in digestion and/or absorption of nutrients: breaking down of food into smaller components that can be absorbed and used as for sources of energy, cellular/tissue building blocks, or cofactors for vital biochemical reactions.
174
questions
2
votes
1
answer
219
views
Colloids in digestion
I am looking for examples of colloids involved in digestion for a cross-curricular (bio-chem-physics) lesson plan. Although I have found references implicating colloids in both lipid and protein ...
- 238
13
votes
2
answers
27k
views
How does HCl not burn our stomach?
How does the digestive acid (HCl) not burn the surrounding membrane of our stomach? It digests the majority of raw food we eat but how does it stay safely in our stomach?
Also, how does the stomach ...
- 385
7
votes
1
answer
727
views
Cooking with sawdust
In a book about post-war Japan (Embracing Defeat, Dower) the author mentions a process for making sawdust at least partially edible, so it could be used in recipes in a 1:4 ratio with flour for ...
- 2,799
7
votes
4
answers
7k
views
Why Do Ruminants Require A Multi-Compartment Stomach To Digest Food?
Cows, camels, sheep, goats, etc being ruminants must chew their food repeatedly by regurgitating their food from their first stomach compartment and chewing their 'cud'. This then finer chewed ...
- 1,191
3
votes
0
answers
123
views
Do humans have chemosensors for nutrients or chemicals? [closed]
I'm reading about chemoreceptors on Wikipedia, and see that the typical ones are mentioned: taste, smell, CO₂. I would like to learn more about the other kinds of chemoreceptors that humans may ...
- 6,517
6
votes
2
answers
52k
views
Does sour food cause sweating?
While eating sour food or candy, I start to sweat if it's sour enough. My body feels much hotter although my actual temperature is the same, my forehead starts sweating a lot and I feel like it just ...
- 275
6
votes
2
answers
251
views
Do omnivore mammals vary food preferences based on dietary needs?
I'm wandering if mammals that can eat many different kinds of food (omnivores) vary their preference for food not only based on the availability, but also based on dietary needs?
I'm looking at this ...
- 6,517
4
votes
2
answers
271
views
Is there a circadian component to hunger?
I'm wondering what produces the feeling of hunger in humans. Checking Wikipedia revealed that leptin and ghrelin are two hormones involved. I've also read that the digestive system produces its own ...
- 6,517
2
votes
1
answer
900
views
Do foods with preservatives become less toxic in the gut?
Do foods with preservatives stay digestible for longer in the gut by not rotting as much (producing less toxins)?
- 417
3
votes
1
answer
205
views
Where are -HCl supplements absorbed in the human digestive system?
I see that quite a lot of drugs and dietary supplements sold in the USA have -HCl(hydrochloride) added to their name. For example pyridoxine hydrochloride for Vitamin B6. I'm interested in knowing ...
- 6,517
8
votes
2
answers
1k
views
Does human digestive system benefit from eating same kind of food consistently?
Here's the reason why I'm asking: I've heard that it takes some time for pets(cats/dogs) to adjust to a different dry feed, where the new feed has to be mixed with the old one, slowly replacing the ...
- 6,517
2
votes
1
answer
67k
views
Ramifications and possibility of a diet consuming exclusively of human semen
Semen is a thick, nutritious liquid, rich in vitamins (such as C, B12), amino acids, lipids, monosaccharides (fructose), et cetera. Can semen's ability to fulfill the needs of human organism provide ...
- 95
8
votes
4
answers
419
views
What gaseous substances do humans emit?
Other than CO₂ and Methane what other gases do humans produce or emit?
For example, does skin decomposition, or aerobic respiration emit any special gases that people don't normally realize or know ...
- 4,509
4
votes
1
answer
241
views
Negative feedback in the fructose metabolism in liver
What happens in liver when large amount of fructose is consumed?
I vaguely remember my biochemistry lecturer telling us that the enzymes that process fructose in the liver does not have negative ...
- 3,080
0
votes
3
answers
7k
views
What part of food gives the blood red color?
Roughly, what I know is, when we eat food it goes into our: Stomach > Small Intestine > Large Intestine > Rectum. So, it just moves through a digestive pipe.
What I don't understand is, what part of ...
- 53
2
votes
2
answers
352
views
How might I break down bread into glucose in a model of the human digestive system?
I need to make a model of the digestive system. It would be really nice to actually show it in action, such as by breaking down bread into glucose or something similar. Is this feasible with a small ...
- 173
5
votes
1
answer
243
views
What is an simple way to burn glucose for visible effect?
I want to make a partially working model of the digestive system that could digest complex carbohydrates. My ultimate goal is to be able to cut up some bread, put it into the model, operate it, and ...
- 173
13
votes
3
answers
224
views
How do baby animals that primarily subsist on cellulose get their initial gut flora?
In the case of mammals like giraffes and koalas, is that bacteria common on the plants they eat so when a baby starts to try to stick something besides its mother's milk in its mouth, it can't digest ...
- 1,963
8
votes
1
answer
250
views
Is it the sphincter that flexes when a human pushes a bowel movement?
Of course the sphincter muscle is at the exit point. To use a toothpaste tube analogy, if I want to squeeze out some toothpaste, it does me little to no good to jostle the nozzle; I need to squeeze ...
- 1,963
23
votes
1
answer
29k
views
Why is coffee a laxative?
How does caffeine (or any additional agents) act as a laxative when ingested? I'm interested in the metabolic/signaling pathway.
- 749
10
votes
2
answers
2k
views
Why do people say that trans fatty acids are bad for your health?
I've heard from several sources that trans FAs are bad for you and their consumption will lead to cardiac problems, and that they are indigestible.
But I also learned from biochemistry that they are ...
- 749
9
votes
1
answer
2k
views
What influences the timing of human bowel movements in the morning?
I'm trying to understand if the timing of human bowel movements in the morning is associated with the circadian rhythm, and can thus be used to make predictions about the circadian rhythm.
What ...
- 6,517
8
votes
1
answer
435
views
What are the biochemical processes occurring when food spoils?
Let's assume for a minute that microbes themselves and their direct toxic products (i.e. endotoxins) aren't toxic to humans. Let's also discount any innate immune responses the body mounts against the ...
- 2,385
12
votes
2
answers
319
views
Why is the microbial ecosystem of the gut so susceptible to disruption by pathogens?
From all accounts, it seems as if the Escherichia, Enterobacter, etc. that live and thrive in the human gut are pretty well entrenched. I know that these microbial populations are often analyzed as ...
- 4,751