Where Does It Go?
You’re sitting at lunch, finishing that last bit of sandwich and chomping on your apple. Then you go outside. In a few minutes, you’re probably talking with friends and not thinking about the food you just ate. While you’ve moved on to other things, your body’s digestive system is hard at work.
Digestion starts in the mouth, where your teeth cut and grind food into small pieces. Saliva, made by the salivary glands, wets and softens food. When you swallow, the food squeezes down a long tube, called the esophagus, into your stomach. The stomach churns your food and adds a digestive juice that turns the food into a soupy liquid. Muscles move the liquid into the small intestine.
In the small intestine, more digestive juices break food into tiny particles called nutrients. These digestive juices are made by organs, such as the liver and pancreas, and delivered to the small intestine. Lining the small intestine are millions of fingerlike structures called villi. Villi capture nutrients that are eventually carried away to feed the cells in your body. Any undigested food moves on to the large intestine where water is absorbed. The remaining material leaves the body as waste.
Q When I think about food, my mouth waters. Why?
A Your brain is “telling” your salivary glands to make extra saliva. In your lifetime, you’ll make enough saliva to fill about 200 bathtubs.
Q My stomach makes a lot of noise. What’s all the rumbling?
A Before and after you eat, gases can be produced. These gases make noise as they gurgle along.
Q Why do I burp?
A Gases from digesting, as well as the air that you swallow while you eat, can build up in your stomach. When there’s no room left, some of the gas can come back up in the form of a burp.