‘We are Clowns!’ is a fun science series for girls and boys made by Big Van Ciencia, a team that carries out scientific dissemination activities for all types of audiences. Here Orilo and Arlequino will explain hilarious scientific stories and very scientific home experiments, with lots of humor and fun.
Thanks to digestion, our body absorbs the necessary nutrients so that all our cells can live. Thanks to digestion we have strength and we can think.
In this video we are going to see a simulation of the digestion process, which begins with the mouth when chewing. Orilo represents the mouth with a container in which Arlequino puts the foods he wants to eat: apple, cookies, milk, lettuce, some lentils …
The first process of digestion is mechanical and occurs through the teeth, which grind and crush food. The incisor teeth cut and the molars crush. In addition, food begins this process of digestion thanks to the chemical action of a substance called amylase that is found in saliva.
Stomach
We swallow all the resulting porridge, it passes through our esophagus and reaches the stomach, which in this video Arlequino simulates with a plastic bag. The stomach is a very muscular organ that is also responsible for continuing to physically crush food. In addition, it has very strong acids, gastric juices, which continue to break down food into very small parts through chemical action. In the video, Harlequino simulates the action of gastric juices with vinegar.
The intestine
The resulting porridge passes to the next organ of digestion: the intestine. The first part is the small intestine, which they simulate with a cropped stocking. The intestine can measure up to five meters, perfectly coiled and ordered in our body. The small intestine is porous, and allows nutrients to be absorbed and pass to the rest of the body.
And what about what’s left? The small intestine gives way to the large intestine, represented with a towel as it is responsible for drying all those foods that we have not been able to digest. In addition, the large intestine has bacteria that are responsible for finishing the fermentation of food to obtain even more nutrients.
The result is nothing more and nothing less than … our poop. In it, for example, we see that there are lettuce remains, this is because there are components of food that we are not able to digest, for example cellulose from plants. That is why it is said that fiber is very good for intestinal transit, as it helps to carry away all waste.
In short: everything we have eaten ends up reaching the large intestine, dries and ferments, and that is why it looks and smells so different from food.
