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The Digestive System Of A Human

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Gabe Menuel. 8H

What does a digestive system do in a human?

A digestive system in a Human is designed to help the human process food into energy and nutrients which are utilised by various systems in the body. The energy and nutrients are used to power and sustain the human being.

The digestive system consists of the gastrointestinal tract and other organs such as the liver, pancreas, and gallbladder. The GI tract has organs joined in a long tube from mouth to anus. There are hollow organs including the mouth, esophagus, stomach, small intestine, large intestine and anus. Food enters the mouth and passes to the anus through the hollow organs of the GI tract. There are also solid organs such as the liver, pancreas, and gallbladder …show more content…

Saliva is produced by the salivary glands which are under the tongue and at the sides of the upper jaw.

The brain can also be tricked to produce by saliva on call, we did this in a science experiment where we rang a bell and then ate some WizzFizz which is a sweet powder with some acids that make the month produce a lot of saliva. After repeating the exercise of ringing the bell and eating the powder many times, we then rang the bell without getting any WizzFizz and found the brain still produced saliva each time the bell was rung.

Even though saliva is produced all the time, extra - and slightly different - saliva is produced for digestion for several reasons One is that it acts as lubricant that helps while mashing up the food and for helping the swallowing process and another is that is releases enzymes that help break down the food by chemical reactions that break bonds in the chemical molecules in the food. One of the main enzymes is amylase which breaks down big sugars and carbohydrates to smaller sugars that are easily available to the body to utilise for energy. Carbohydrates are the sugars, starches, and fiber found in many foods. Carbohydrates are called simple or complex, the simple ones include sugars found naturally in foods such as fruits, vegetables, milk, as well as sugars added during food processing. Special carbohydrates are starches and fiber

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