Study shows how alligators digest heavy bones
By: Carlos Mayorga
Issue date: 2/15/08 Section: News
When a raccoon approaches a lake to drink water, it may not be aware of the imminent danger below the water's surface.
Even in the pitch dark, when an alligator is completely submerged in the water except for its eyes, alligators have freckles on their snouts that can sense ripples in the water and know when a potential meal is sipping at the waters' banks.
Alligators can be violent, fierce predators that can tear prey into pieces, swallowing whole chunks at a time. In a single meal, these crocodilians can consume prey up to 23 percent of the size of their own body weight, which is comparable to a 130-lb. woman eating a 30-lb. hamburger.
A recent study headed by U biologist Colleen Farmer shows how crocodilians possess the unique ability to bypass blood flowing to the lungs and divert it to the stomach, allowing it to digest large amounts of food at once. Higher levels of blood in the stomach spark an increase in gastric acid, speeding up the alligator's capacity to digest the strong bones of its prey.
Researchers have known for some time that crocodilians have this ability, but scientists were relatively unaware of how vital the process is to an alligator's survival until Farmer's study.
Unlike humans and other animals, crocodilians possess a special vessel called the left aorta that they can choose to activate for digestion.
Using the left aorta allows carbon-dioxide-rich blood to bypass the lungs and go straight to the stomach to aid in the digestive process. The stomach then uses the CO2 in the blood to produce gastric acid and bicarbonate at a rate that is at least 10 times faster than what has been measured in mammals.
"What is intriguing about Colleen's work is that she is the first to test out this hypothesis," said James Hicks, editor in chief of the Physiological and Biochemical Zoology, a journal published by the University of Chicago Press, which will publish the study's findings next month.
In order to understand more about this process, researchers placed a probe around the left aorta in test alligators and studied the animals during fasting and after a meal. Scientists found a correlation in the use of the vessel during digestion, but wanted to prove it further, Farmer said.
Even in the pitch dark, when an alligator is completely submerged in the water except for its eyes, alligators have freckles on their snouts that can sense ripples in the water and know when a potential meal is sipping at the waters' banks.
Alligators can be violent, fierce predators that can tear prey into pieces, swallowing whole chunks at a time. In a single meal, these crocodilians can consume prey up to 23 percent of the size of their own body weight, which is comparable to a 130-lb. woman eating a 30-lb. hamburger.
A recent study headed by U biologist Colleen Farmer shows how crocodilians possess the unique ability to bypass blood flowing to the lungs and divert it to the stomach, allowing it to digest large amounts of food at once. Higher levels of blood in the stomach spark an increase in gastric acid, speeding up the alligator's capacity to digest the strong bones of its prey.
Researchers have known for some time that crocodilians have this ability, but scientists were relatively unaware of how vital the process is to an alligator's survival until Farmer's study.
Unlike humans and other animals, crocodilians possess a special vessel called the left aorta that they can choose to activate for digestion.
Using the left aorta allows carbon-dioxide-rich blood to bypass the lungs and go straight to the stomach to aid in the digestive process. The stomach then uses the CO2 in the blood to produce gastric acid and bicarbonate at a rate that is at least 10 times faster than what has been measured in mammals.
"What is intriguing about Colleen's work is that she is the first to test out this hypothesis," said James Hicks, editor in chief of the Physiological and Biochemical Zoology, a journal published by the University of Chicago Press, which will publish the study's findings next month.
In order to understand more about this process, researchers placed a probe around the left aorta in test alligators and studied the animals during fasting and after a meal. Scientists found a correlation in the use of the vessel during digestion, but wanted to prove it further, Farmer said.
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