Learn how the Digestive System Works

Male Speaker: There are up to 15 feet of gut folded inside you the main part is the esophagus, stomach, the small intestine, and the large intestine. The liver in the pancreas make the chemicals leaded for digesting your food. When you swallow muscles in the esophagus push the food towards the stomach. The way the guts sequences and pushes the food is called peristalsis. Food is stored for a while in the stomach and mixed with acid and enzymes. Here protein digestion starts. After a couple of hours food passes into the small intestine; digestive enzymes pour in from the pancreas and digitizing of carbohydrates and fats begins in earnest.

There are many folds in the gut bowl called villi, even the wall of the cells lying in the gut are folded. During digestion large molecules like starch are broken down into smaller molecules like glucose, which can then be absorbed through the surface of the gut bowl. Because of the folding the surface area is large. This makes the movement of molecules into the blood stream called absorption more efficient.


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