The Life Story of A Piece of Corn

The Life Story of A Piece of Corn

The EsophagusAs I traveled out of her mouth, a flap of tissue (epiglottis) sealed off her windpipe to prevent us from entering the trachea. I felt the girl swallow, and I was sucked into a tube lined with folds and ridges of muscles (esophagus). It was filled with a very thick, slippery liquid (mucus), which made us easier to be swallowed. Suddenly, I felt the walls around us start to shake. The muscle around us contracted then expanded. I was scared. Was it an earthquake? No, it was called peristalsis, my friend reassured me. The action was to push us towards the stomach, and it was perfectly normal.

The MouthAll I saw was her mouth watering with saliva before I was sucked in a dark hole called the mouth. When I first entered the mouth, I was surprised at how smooth the inside was. It must have been the epithelial muscles lining her cheek. A strong tongue pushed my fellow corn around and around while the connective tissue in her mouth (teeth) did their mechanical digesting job. The center teeth (incisors) cut my friends and I into tiny, bite-sized pieces. Next to the incisors, her sharp, pointy canines tore me into even smaller pieces. In the very back, her premolars and molars crushed and ground me up. To finish us up, saliva moistened the remaining pieces and we were stuck together in a slippery clump to face the next step in our digestion.

The StomachAfter just only 10 seconds or so, we were all dropped into a pouch that expanded to hold all of us. It was lined with a lot of blood vessels. Before I was able to calm myself after that frightening experience, something strong - I think they were muscles - started squeezing and mixing us up with different liquids. I didn't want to leave my friends, but there was nothing we could do. The liquid contained something called pepsin. It helped break down the proteins the girl had eaten. The liquid also contained a type of acid that hurt a lot when I touched it. It's supposed to kill the bacteria among us. I bet a few of us died from the acid - I was always a bit suspicious of a few of the corn. You may ask why her stomach wasn't destroyed by the strong acid. It's because the stomach also contains mucus, which protects the stomach from getting demolished. We spent nearly 4 hours in that pouch.

The Liver and The GallbladderThe liver produces bile, a substance that breaks up fat particles. It flows to the gallbladder, an organ that stores bile. After someone eats, bile passes from the gallbladder to the small intestine through a tube.The PancreasThe pancreas produce enzymes that help break down starches, proteins, and fats. These enzymes flow to the small intestine.

The Small IntestineBy the time we reached the small intestine, we were unrecognizable. Our once handsome, bright yellowish features had turned into a thick, ugly liquid. There were many tiny, fingerlike spokes (villi) lining the tube. Their job is to absorb nutrient molecules. The blood cells at the center of the villi are to carry the nutrients to other parts in the body. Here, during our chemical digesting, we were mixed with other enzymes and secretions, produced and delivered by the liver, the pancreas, and the small intestine itself. The girl's small intestine was all bunched up because if the whole thing was one straight line, a person would have to be at least 20 feet tall! It took us 3 hours to go through the small intestine.

The Large IntestineMy journey through the human body ends with the large intestine. It is a tube shaped like a horseshoe I guess. We met a couple of unusually nice bacteria. Someone said that they don't normally cause disease. In fact, they are quite helpful because they make certain vitamins. During our nearly 2 day stay in the large intestine, all the water around us was absorbed by the bloodstream, and by the end, the rest of us stopped in a short tube (rectum) at the end of the large intestine. We were then squeezed into a solid form, and left the body through a very muscular opening at the end of the rectum (anus).

Enzyme: A protein that speeds up chemical reactions in the body.