What is the stomach?

The stomach is an organ of digestion. It has a saclike shape and is located between
the esophagus and the intestines. Almost every animal has a stomach.

The human stomach is a muscular, elastic, pear-shaped bag, lying crosswise in the
abdominal cavity beneath the diaphragm. It changes size and shape according to is
position of the body and the amount of food inside. The stomach is about 12 inches
(30.5 cm) long and is 6 inches. (15.2 cm) wide at its widest point. The stomach's
capacity is about 1 qt (0.94 liters) in an adult.

Food enters the stomach from the esophagus. The connection between the stomach
and the esophagus is called the cardiac sphincter. The cardiac sphincter prevents
food from passing back to the esophagus. Heart burn is the sensation when
stomach juices (gastric juice) is allowed to seep through the sphincter into the
esophagus. Once the food enters the stomach, gastric juices are used to break
down the food. Some substances are absorbed muscle lining of the stomach. One of
the substances the stomach absorbs is alcohol.

The other end of the stomach empties into the duodenum. The duodenum is the
first section of the small intestine. The pyloric sphincter separates the stomach from
the duodenum.

The stomach is composed of five layers. Starting from the inside and working our
way out, the innermost layer is called the mucosa. Stomach acid and digestive
juices are made in the mucosa layer. The next layer is called the submucosa. The
submucosa is surrounded by the muscularis, a layer of muscle that moves and
mixes the stomach contents. The next two layers, the subserosa and the serosa are
the wrapping for the stomach. The serosa is the outermost layer of the stomach.

Diseases of the Stomach

Some of the common stomach conditions are: stomach ulcer, gastritis, and stomach
cancer. If there is bleeding in the stomach, black stool may occur.
Digestion is the breaking down of food in the body, into a form that can be absorbed
and used or excreted. It is also the process by which the body breaks down food
into smaller components that can be absorbed by the blood stream.

Mechanical and chemical digestion begin in the mouth where food is chewed, and
mixed with saliva to break down starches. The stomach continues to break food
down mechanically and chemically through the churning of the stomach and mixing
with enzymes. Absorption occurs in the stomach and gastrointestinal tract, and the
process finishes with excretion.

Digestion is usually divided into mechanical processing to reduce the size of food
particles and chemical action to further reduce the size of particles and prepare
them for absorption

Ingestion: placing food into the mouth.

Mechanical digestion & chemical digestion: mastication to tear and crush food, and
churning of the stomach. Addition of chemicals (acid, bile, enzymes, and water) to
break down complex molecules into simple structures.

Absorption: movement of nutrients from the digestive system to the circulatory and
lymphatic capillaries through osmosis, active transport, and diffusion.

Egestion: Removal of undigested materials from the digestive tract through

defecation.

The Stages of Digestion:

Picture of the human digestive system

1/ Cephalic phase - This phase occurs before food enters the stomach and involves
preparation of the body for eating and digestion. Sight and thought stimulate the
cerebral cortex. Taste and smell stimulus is sent to the hypothalamus and medulla
oblongata. After this it is routed through the vagus nerve and release of
acetylcholine.

2/ Digestion begins in the oral cavity where food is chewed. Saliva is secreted in
large amounts by three pairs of exocrine salivary glands (parotid, submandibular,
and sublingual) in the oral cavity, and is mixed with the chewed food by the tongue.

The Esophagus, a narrow, muscular tube about 30 centimeters (12 inches) long,
starts at the pharynx, passes through the larynx and diaphragm, and ends at the
cardiac orifice of the stomach. The wall of the Esophagus is made up of two layers
of smooth muscles, which form a continuous layer from the Esophagus to the oten
and contract slowly, over long periods of time.

3/ The food enters the stomach after passing through the cardiac orifice. In the
stomach, food is further broken apart, and thoroughly mixed with a gastric acid and
digestive enzymes that break down proteins. The acid itself does not break down
food molecules, rather, the acid provides an optimum pH for the reaction of the
enzyme pepsin.

4/ After being processed in the stomach, food is passed to the small intestine via
the Pyloric sphincter. The majority of digestion and absorption that occurs here as
chyme enters the duodenum. Here it is further mixed with three different liquids:

a) bile, which emulsifies fats to allow absorption, neutralizes the chyme, and is
used to excrete waste products such as bilin and bile acids (which has other uses as
well). It is not an enzyme, however. The bile juice is stored in a small organ called
the gall bladder.
b) pancreatic juice made by the pancreas.

c) intestinal enzymes of the alkaline mucosal membranes. The enzymes include:

maltase, lactase and sucrase, to process sugars; trypsin and chymotrypsin are also
added in the small intestine.

Most nutrient absorption takes place in the small intestine.

5/ After the food has been passed through the small intestine, the food enters the
large intestine. The large intestine is roughly 1.5 meters long, with three parts: the
cecum at the junction with the small intestine, the colon, and the rectum. The colon
itself has four parts: the ascending colon, the transverse colon, the descending
colon, and the sigmoid colon.

Gastric juice is a strong acidic liquid, pH 1 to 3 in humans, which is close to being colourless.
The hormone gastrin is released into the bloodstream when peptides are detected in the stomach.
This causes gastric glands in the lining of the stomach to secrete gastric juice. Its main
components are digestive enzymes pepsin and rennin (rennin found in cows and babies),
hydrochloric acid, and mucus. [1]