11. How does butter in your food get digested and absorbed in the body?
Answer
Butter is a fat-based product. The digestion process is discussed below:
Digestion of fats
Fats are digested in the small intestine. The liver secretes bile juice which contains bile salts such as bilirubin and biliverdin. These break down large fat globules into smaller globules, to increase their surface area for the action of lipase. This process is called emulsification of fats. Later, the pancreatic lipase present in the pancreatic juice and the intestinal lipase present in the intestinal juice hydrolyse the fat molecules into triglycerides, diglycerides, monoglycerides, and finally glycerol.
Absorption of fats
During the digestion of fats, the fats are broken down into fatty acids and glycerol. These are water-insoluble substances, hence, they cannot be directly absorbed by the blood. Therefore, they are first incorporated into small droplets called micelles and then transported into the villi of the intestinal mucosa. These are then converted into small microscopic particles called chylomicrons, which are small, protein-coated fat globules. These chylomicrons are transported to the lymph vessels in the villi. From the lymph vessels, the absorbed food is finally released into the bloodstream and from the bloodstream, to every cell of the body.