IGCSE- 0653 Combined Science BIOLOGY

TOPIC: ANIMAL NUTRITION

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Diet
• Diet is the food animals eat everyday.
• The six main types of nutrients needed by humans are:
• Carbohydrate
• Protein
• Fats and oil
• Vitamins
• Minerals
• Water
• Fibres*(roughage)
Note that, fibre is not really a nutrient, as it is not absorbed into the body.
It just passes straight through the digestive system and is passed out in the faeces.
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Energy needs
• Every day, a person uses
up energy.
• The amount you use
partly depends on how
old you are, which sex you
are and what job you do.
• A few examples are
shown in the figure.

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 Energy needs
• A person’s diet may need to
change at different times of their
life.
• For example, a woman will need
to eat a little more each day
when she is pregnant, and make
sure that she has extra calcium
and iron in her diet, to help to
build her baby’s bones, teeth and
blood.
• She will also need to eat more
while she is breast feeding.
• Most people find that they need
to eat less as they reach their 50s
and 60s, because their
metabolism slows down.
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Balanced diet
• A balanced diet is a diet which contains all the nutrients needed by
the body in their right proportion.

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Nutrients
• As well as providing you with energy, food is needed for many other
reasons. To make sure that you eat a balanced diet, you must eat
foods containing carbohydrate, fat and protein.
• You also need each kind of vitamin and mineral, fibre and water.
• If your diet doesn’t contain all of these substances, your body will not
be able to work properly.

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 Carbohydrates
• Carbohydrates are needed for
energy.
• Carbohydrates include starch
and sugar.
• In most countries, there is a
staple food that supplies much
of the carbohydrate in people’s
diets, in the form of starch.
• Staple foods include potatoes,
wheat (often made into bread
or pasta), rice and maize.
• We also eat carbohydrate in
sweet foods, which contain
sugar.
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 Fats and oils
• Fats and oils are needed for energy,
and to make cell membranes.
• We store excess fat and oil under the
skin, in adipose tissue.
• Here, it acts as an insulator, reducing
heat loss from the body to the air
• It can also form a layer around body
organs such as the kidneys, providing
mechanical protection for them.
• We obtain fat from cooking oils, meat,
eggs, dairy products and oily fish.

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Proteins
• Proteins are needed to build
new cells, for growth.
• They are also used to make
proteins, including
haemoglobin, insulin (a
hormone) and antibodies
(which help to destroy
pathogens).
• We get protein from meat, fish,
eggs, dairy products, peas and
beans, nuts and seeds.

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Vitamins
• Vitamins are organic substances which are only needed in tiny
amounts. If you do not have enough of a vitamin, you may get a
deficiency disease.
• The Table shows information about sources and uses in the body of
vitamins C and D.

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 Minerals
• Minerals are inorganic substances. Once again, only small amounts of them
are needed in the diet.
• The table gives information about the sources and uses of two of the most
important ones.

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 Fibre/roughage
• Fibre helps to keep the alimentary canal
working properly.
• The alimentary canal is the part of the
digestive system through which food passes
as it moves from the mouth to the anus.
• Food moves through the alimentary canal
because the muscles contract and relax to
squeeze it along. This is called persistalsis.
• The muscles are stimulated to do this when
there is food in the alimentary canal.
• Soft foods do not stimulate the muscles very
much.
• The muscles are stimulated to do this when
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there is food in the alimentary canal.
 Fibre/roughage
•.
• The muscles work more strongly when there is
harder, less digestible food, like fibre, in the
alimentary canal.
• Fibre keeps the digestive system in good working
order and helps to prevent constipation.
• All plant foods, such as fruits and vegetables,
contain fibre.
• This is because plant cells have cellulose cell walls.
Humans cannot digest cellulose.
• One excellent source of fibre is the outer husk of
cereal grains, such as oats, wheat and barley. This is
called bran. Some of this husk is found in
wholemeal bread. Brown or unpolished rice is also
a good source of fibre.
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Water
• More than 60% of the human body is water. Water is an important
solvent. Cytoplasm is a solution of many substances in water.
• The spaces between our cells are also filled with a watery liquid.
Inside our cells, chemical reactions are happening all the time.
• These are called metabolic reactions. They can only take place if the
chemicals that are reacting are in solution. If a cell dries out, then the
reactions stop, and the cell dies.

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Water
• The liquid part of blood, plasma, is also mostly water. It contains many
substances dissolved in it, which are transported around the body in
the blood.
• Water is also needed to dissolve enzymes and nutrients in the
alimentary canal, so that digestion can take place (Topic 7.3).
• We also need water to get rid of waste products. As you will see in ,
the kidneys remove a waste product called urea from the blood. The
urea is dissolved in water to form urine.
• We get most of our water by drinking fluids, but some foods such as
fruit also contain a lot of water.
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Human digestive system

• The human digestive system includes the alimentary canal and also
the liver and the pancreas.
• All of these work together to break down the food that we eat, so
that it can be absorbed into the blood and delivered to all body cells.

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Keys terms & definitions

• Ingestion: This means taking food and drink into the mouth. We do this
using the lips, teeth and tongue.
• Digestion: The breakdown of large, insoluble molecules into small, water
soluble molecules using mechanical and chemical processes.
• Physical digestion: the breakdown of food into smaller pieces without
chemical change to the food molecules. Physical digestion increases the
surface area of the food for the action of enzymes in chemical digestion.
• Chemical digestion: the breakdown of large insoluble molecules into small
soluble molecules with the use of enzymes which results in a chemical
change.

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Keys terms & definitions
• Absorption: This is the movement of the small nutrient molecules and
mineral ions through the walls of the intestines and into the blood.
• Assimilation: the movement of digested food molecules into the cells of the
body where they are used for energy to make new substances, becoming
part of the cells.
• the movement of digested food molecules into the cells of the body where
they are used, becoming part of the cells.
• Egestion: This is the removal of undigested food from the body. There is
always some material in our food that we cannot digest. Much of this is
fibre. This is not absorbed. It remains in the intestines and eventually passes
out as faeces.

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Alimentary canal
• The alimentary canal is a long tube which runs from the mouth to the
anus.
• It is part of the digestive system. As we have seen, the digestive
system also includes the liver and the pancreas.
• The wall of the alimentary canal contains muscles, which contract and
relax to make food move along.
• These muscular contractions are called peristalsis.
• Sometimes, it is necessary to keep the food in one part of the
alimentary canal for a while, before it is allowed to move to the next
part.
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Alimentary canal
• Special muscles can close the tube completely in certain places. They
are called sphincter muscle.
• To help the food to slide easily through the alimentary canal, it is
lubricated with mucus.
• Mucus is made in goblet cells which are in the which are found in the
lining of the alimentary canal, along its entire length.
• Each section of the alimentary canal has its own part to play in the
digestion, absorption and egestion of food.

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Human digestive system

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 Mouth
• Food is ingested using the teeth, lips and tongue.
• The teeth then bite or grind the food into smaller
pieces, increasing its surface area. This begins
physical digestion.
• The tongue mixes the food with saliva and forms it
into a little ball that can be swallowed.
• The salivary gland make saliva. This is a mixture of
water, mucus and the enzyme amylase.
• The water helps to dissolve substances in the food,
allowing us to taste them.
• The mucus helps the chewed food to bind together
to form a small ball, and lubricates it so that it
slides easily down the oesophagus when it is
swallowed.
• Amylase begins to digest starch in the mouth
• It breaks down starch to maltose.. 22
Oesophagus/gullet
• There are two tubes leading down from
the back of the mouth.
• The one in front is the trachea or
windpipe, which takes air down to the
lungs.
• Behind the trachea is the oesophagus,
which takes food down to the stomach.
• The ‘hole’ in the centre of the
oesophagus, down which food can
pass, is called a lumen.
• This word is used to describe the space
in the middle of any tube in the body.
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Oesophagus/gullet
• The contraction and relaxing of the
muscles of the oesophagus to push
food through it to the stomach is
termed as peristalsis.
• There is a lumen in all parts of the
alimentary canal. All blood vessels
also have a lumen.
• The entrance to the stomach from
the oesophagus is closed by a
sphincter muscle.
• The muscle relaxes to let food pass
into the stomach, then contracts to
close the entrance again.
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 Stomach
• The stomach has strong, muscular walls.
• The muscles contract and relax to mix the food
with the enzymes and mucus.
• Like all parts of the alimentary canal, the stomach
wall contains goblet cells which secrete mucus.
• The walls of the stomach secrets a liquid called
gastric juice which contains hydrochloric acid and
enzymes.
• It also contains other cells which produce enzymes
and others which make hydrochloric acid.
• The enzymes produced in the stomach digest
proteins, so they are protease.
• The enzyme pepsin is the type of protease that
breaks down proteins to peptide.
• Pepsin has an optimum pH of 2, so it is perfectly
suited to working in these very acidic conditions.
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 Stomach
• The hydrochloric acid produces a
low pH, of about pH 2, in the
stomach, which kills harmful
microorganisms in the food.
• This pH is also the optimum pH for
the protease enzymes that act in
the stomach.
• The stomach can store food for
quite a long time.
• After one or two hours, the
sphincter at the bottom of the
stomach opens and lets the partly
digested food (chyme) move into
the duodenum. 26
Small intestine (duodenum and ileum)
• The small intestine is the part of the
alimentary canal which is made up of the
duodenum and ileum.
• It is about 5 m long. It is called the small
intestine because it is quite narrow.
• Different parts of the small intestine have
different names.
• The first part, nearest to the stomach, is
the duodenum.
• The last part, nearest to the colon, is the
ileum.
• The pancreas is a cream-coloured gland,
lying just underneath the stomach. 27
Small intestine-duodenum
• A tube called the pancreatic duct leads from the
pancreas into the duodenum.
• Pancreatic juice is a fluid made by the pancreas.
• It flows along the pancreatic duct into the
duodenum.
• Pancreatic juice contains many different
enzymes, including
• amylase which breaks down starch to maltose,
• trypsin (protease) which breaks down protein
to polypeptides,
• Trypsin has an optimum pH just above 7.
• lipase which breaks down fat to fatty acid and
glycerol so chemical digestion continues in the
duodenum. 28
Small intestine-duodenum
• These enzymes do not work well in acid environment,
but the chyme which has come from the stomach
contains hydrochloric acid.
• Pancreatic juice contain sodium hydrogencarbonate
which partially neutralise the acid.
Bile
• Bile is produced by the liver.
• The bile that has been made by the liver is stored in the
gall bladder.
• Bile is a yellowish green, alkaline, watery liquid.
• When food enters the duodenum, the bile flows along
the bile duct and is mixed with the food in the
duodenum.
• Bile emulsifies fat, that is, it breaks down large fat
molecules to smaller ones, which increases the surface
area which makes it easier for lipase to digest. This
process is called emulsification. 29
Large intestine (colon and rectum)
• The large intestine is made up of colon and
rectum.
• The colon absorbs much of the water that
still remains in the food.
• However the colon absorbs much less water
than the small intestines.
• The rectum stores undigested food as faeces.
• Faeces is made up of indigestible
food(roughage and fibre), bacteria and some
dead cells from the inside of the alimentary
canal
• These are then egested from the body
through the anus.

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Physical and chemical digestion

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Enzymes in the human body (chemical
digestion)

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Teeth
• Teeth help with the ingestion and physical/mechanical digestion of
the food we eat.
• Teeth can be used to bite off pieces of food.
• They then chop, crush or grind the pieces into smaller pieces.
• This gives the food a larger surface area, which makes it easier for
enzymes to work on in the digestive system.
• It also helps any soluble molecules or ions in the food to dissolve in
the watery saliva in the mouth.

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The structure of the tooth

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Enamel
• This is the hardest part of the tooth.
It very difficult to chip or break it.
• This part of the tooth is above the
gum.
• However, it can be dissolved by acids.
• Bacteria feed on sweet foods left on
the teeth.
• These bacteria produce acids, which
dissolve the enamel and cause decay.

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Dentine
• Under the enamel is the dentine
which is rather like bone.
• Dentine is quite hard, but not as
hard as enamel.
• It has channels in it which contain
living cytoplasm.
• The blood vessels in the middle of
the tooth supply the cytoplasm in
the dentine with nutrients and
oxygen.

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Pulp cavity
• This is the middle part if the
tooth.
• It contains nerves and blood
vessels which supplies the
cytoplasm in the dentine with
nutrients and oxygen.

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Cement
• This is the part of the tooth that is
embedded in the gum.
• This attaches the tooth to the jaw
bone but allow it to move slightly
when biting or chewing.
• The cement has fibres growing
out of it.

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Types/kinds of teeth

• Incisor
• Canine
• Premolar
• Molar

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Types/kinds of teeth
• Incisor
• Canine
• Premolar
• Molar

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 Incisor
• These are the
sharped-edged,
chisel-shaped teeth
at the front of the
mouth.
• They are used for
biting off pieces of
food.

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Canine

• They have pointed shapes.

• They are used of tearing and
gripping food.

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Premolar/molars
• They have flat surfaces with cusp
ridges.
• They are for chewing, grinding and
crushing food.
• Premolars have wide surfaces for
grinding.
• In humans, the ones right at the
back are sometimes called wisdom
teeth.
• They do not grow until much later
in the person’s development than
the other
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