The digestive system
| English | Chinese | Pinyin |
|---|---|---|
| digestive system | 消化系统 | xiāo huà xì tǒng |
| oesophagus | 食道 | shí dào |
| small intestine | 小肠 | xiǎo cháng |
| peristalsis | 蠕动 | rú dòng |
| liver | 肝脏 | gān zàng |
| bile | 胆汁 | dǎn zhī |
| pancreas | 胰腺 | yí xiàn |
| ingestion | 摄入 | shè rù |
| absorption | 吸收 | xī shōu |
The journey of a meal
- The food you eat is too big for your cells to use. It must be broken down and absorbed.
- That's the job of the digestive system 消化系统 — a long tube with specialised parts.
Put these parts of the gut in the order food passes through them.
Mouth → oesophagus → stomach → small intestine → large intestine.
Food is moved along the gut by waves of muscle contraction called:
Peristalsis squeezes food along the gut.
The main organs
- Mouth → oesophagus 食道 → stomach → small intestine 小肠 → large intestine.
- Food is moved along by waves of muscle contraction called peristalsis 蠕动.
The alimentary canal that food passes through, plus the organs that add digestive juices
Through the digestive system
Food travels along the gut; each part does a different job to break it down and absorb it.
The pancreas makes:
The pancreas produces enzymes; the liver makes bile.
The organ that produces bile is the ______.
The liver makes bile; the gall bladder stores it.
Helper organs
- The liver 肝脏 makes bile 胆汁; the gall bladder stores it.
- The pancreas 胰腺 makes digestive enzymes.
Egestion is the removal of undigested food (faeces).
Egestion removes the waste food that was never absorbed.
Key stages
- Ingestion 摄入 (taking in), digestion (breaking down), absorption 吸收 (into the blood), egestion (removing waste).
Worked example. A piece of bread is chewed (mouth), churned with acid (stomach), digested by enzymes (small intestine), absorbed into the blood, and the leftover fibre is egested. Each organ has its role.
You've got it
- the gut: mouth → oesophagus → stomach → small intestine → large intestine; moved by peristalsis
- the liver makes bile; the pancreas makes enzymes
- stages: ingestion → digestion → absorption → egestion