Hi, now we are going to discuss cellulose digestion in different organisms because cellulose is a biomolecule which is not so easy to digest due to its complex structure and it is mainly present in most of the plant parts especially the woody part is rich in cellulose. Most Herbivores face cellulose because their diet is rich in cellulose and they have to digest it to get the metabolic energy.
But in most of the organism not able to digest cellulose property because they do not have special mechanism for cellulose digestion and we will discuss about different herbivores and how they can digest cellulose easily but before we discuss more we will discuss a little bit about the cellulose.
Table of Contents
Basic Idea About Cellulose:
Cellulose is a complex carbohydrate or polysaccharide and they are chemically polymer if simple sugars unit and highly available in plant tissues outside the living part of the cell and secreted by the plasma membrane which gives a tough cover around the living cells.
In cellulose different monomeric sugar units are linked to each other by glycosidic bond and the polymeric chain in carbohydrates are unbranched and straight and its fibrous nature gives a plant tissue tensile strength and the plant can be present upright.
Cellulose Digestion in Human:
Human can not digest other carbohydrates like disaccharides and polysaccharide because different hydrolytic enzymes present in their saliva, pancreatic juice and intestinal juice can break down the disaccharides and polysaccharide but there are no enzymes present in human digestive system which can digest cellulose.
Because to break down cellulose we have to break down the beta acetal linkage but our digestive system have no enzymes to perform this biochemical reactions and for this reason we can not break down the monosaccharides bond in cellulose polymer so we can not digest cellulose.
We can not digest cellulose, then why do we take cellulose in our diet because if we can not break down the cellulose into simple sugars then we can not use cellulose as a source of energy because without making them simple sugars we can not use them in respiration.
We take cellulose rich foods in our diet because cellulose has a great amount of fibres which is beneficial for our health because fibres help smooth movement in our intestinal tract so even if we get no energy we yet take cellulose rich foods in our diet.
Cellulose Digestion in Ruminants:
Ruminants take a lot of plant food rich in cellulose as their primary source of food and they can digest the cellulose also to meet their metabolic energy.
It is possible due to their four chambered stomach which have several bacteria like Rumenococcus and some enzymes which performs the digestion of cellulose in their multi chambered stomach and one of the chambers is known as rumen.
In their stomach cellulose reacts with some enzymes and breaks down partially by the action of some anaerobic bacteria then the partially digested cellulose rich foods they chew again to help in better digestion then it again goes to the stomach and completes the digestion process.
Digestion of Cellulose in Termites:
Termites generally feed on paper and woody structure in our house but they have to digest the cellulose to get metabolic energy because paper and wood are rich in cellulose.
Some symbiotic microorganisms present in the gut of termites and when they eat cellulose rich foods the Cellulose is break down into simpler sugar by the activities of their symbiotic bacteria present in their gut so termites can not digest cellulose without those microorganisms, they completely rely on the gut microorganisms for digestion of cellulose and utilities the cellulose to obtain metabolic energy.
Read More: Role of Digestive Enzymes in Digestion
Hi Everyone!!! Welcome to Imaluop. Imaluop always try to learn some new and he want to share to other people. Here we will try to learn various topics on Science, specially on Biological Sciences.