Digestion Flashcards
What are the 4 main steps to digestion?
1) Ingestion and the propulsion of food along the digestive tract (eating + swallowing)
2) Digestion of food (breaking down nutrients)
3) Absorption of food (where the nutrients leave the digestive and are absorbed by the body)
4) Elimination of fecal matter ( pooping)
Why do we digest our food?
important for breaking down food into nutrients
What is ingestion?
the act of taking something into the body through the mouth (food, liquid, medication, etc.)
2 mechanisms move food along our digestive tract:
1) Deglutition AKA Swallowing
2) Peristalsis, muscular contractions of the esophagus, stomach, small intestine and large intestine move substances through the digestive tract.
What happens to our epiglottis when we swallow?
When we swallow, the epiglottis closes the trachea (a tube that allows air to reach the lungs), and the uvula moves backwards to close off the nasal cavity. Food can then travel to the esophagus without getting into the respiratory tract.
What’s the digestive system official job description?
to break down the food into molecules so that they’re small enough to be absorbed by the body + to eliminate the undigested food from the body
what are the components of the digestive track?
mouth,pharynx,esophogus,stomach, small & large intestines
what are the components of the digestive glands?
Salivary, Gastric, Liver, pancreas ad intestinal glands
What are the 2 mechanisms that move food along the digestive track?
deglution and peristalsis
what is peristalsis?
the muscle contrations wich move food along the digestive track
what CLOSES in our mouth wehn we swalllow
epiglottis wich closes the trachea
what MOVES BACKWARDS in the mouth when swalloing?
the uvula closes the nasal cavity.
what are the two parts of food transformation in the digestive process
mechanical and chemical transformation
What is MECHANICAL transformation?
chewing and churning
WHERE and HOW does digestion end?
it ends in the small intestine, it then gets passed down into the large instestine, through the rectum and anus then poop
