Contributions to the physiology of digestion and to dietetics / by W. G. Aitchison Robertson.

  • Robertson W. G. Aitchison (William George Aitchison)
Date:
1903
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: Contributions to the physiology of digestion and to dietetics / by W. G. Aitchison Robertson. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh. The original may be consulted at the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh.

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    and sugar had probably undergone this change during the process of mastication and swallowing, and for a very short period after its entrance into the stomach. In the case of the dyspeptic, the ferment was not killed after a stay of ten minutes in the stomach, and was still able to continue its amylolytic action in a less acid medium. A stay of five minutes longer, however, in the stomach, during which time the amount of acid had increased, was enough to kill the ferment, as after being neutralized no further amylolytic action took place. We may therefore state that the diastatic ferment of the saliva is killed by a certain degree of acidity of the gastric contents (varying from 0'06 to 01 per cent, hydrochloric acid), and, depend- ing on the rapidity of the production of this acid, it continues active in the stomach till this limit is reached. The sugar formed from starch during this period must be at once absorbed in health, as it is not found in the stomach at a later stage in digestion. Had proteids been present the free acidity would have taken a much longer time to develop, and consequently starch proteolysis would have advanced much further. This shows, then, that unless starch undergoes the process of mastication most thoroughly, it is not so well digested in the stomach as when it is accompanied by proteid matters. My experiments show that free acidity is soon developed on a purely carbohydrate diet, whereas it is much later when a mixed diet is partaken of. PRINTED BY OLIVER AND BOYD, EDINBURGH.