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Animal Nutrition
• Nutrient Requirements
• Animals are heterotrophs that derive their energy and structural building blocks from food,
therefore ultimately from autotrophs.

• Different animals need mineral elements in different amounts.

• Macronutrients are needed in large amounts.

• Micronutrients are needed in small amounts.

• Vitamins are organic molecules that must be obtained in food.

• Malnutrition results when any essential nutrient is lacking from the diet.

• Lack of any essential nutrient causes a deficiency disease.

• Adaptations for Feeding

• Animals can be characterized by how they acquire nutrition

• Saprotrophs and detritivores depend on dead organic matter

• Filter feeders strain the environment for food

• Herbivores eat plants

• Carnivores eat animals.

• Behavioral and anatomical adaptations reflect feeding types.

• In vertebrates, teeth have evolved to match diet.

• Digestion
• Digestion involves the breakdown of complex food molecules into monomers that can be absorbed
and utilized by cells.

• In most animals, digestion is extracellular, external to the body, occurring in a tubular gut with
regions specialized for different digestive functions.

• Absorptive areas of the gut are characterized by a large surface area.

• Hydrolytic enzymes break down proteins, carbohydrates, and fats into their monomeric units.

• To prevent the organism itself from being digested, these are released as inactive zymogens, only
activated when secreted into the gut.
• Structure and Function of the Vertebrate Gut
• Cells and tissues of the vertebrate gut are organized in the same way throughout its length.

• The innermost tissue layer, the mucosa, is the secretory and digestive surface.

• The submucosa contains secretory cells and glands, blood and lymph vessels, and nerves.

• External to the submucosa are two smooth muscle layers that move food through the gut.

• Between these is a nerve network that controls gut movements.

• The swallowing reflex pushes food into the esophagus.

• Waves of smooth muscle contraction and relaxation (peristalsis) move food from the beginning of
the esophagus through the length of the gut.

• Sphincters block the gut at certain locations, but relax as a wave of peristalsis approaches.

• Enzymatic digestion begins in the mouth, where amylase is secreted with saliva.

• Protein digestion begins in the stomach with pepsin and HCl secreted by the stomach mucosa.

• The mucosa also secretes mucus, to protect gut tissues.

• In the the duodenum, pancreatic enzymes carry out most of digestion.

• Bile from liver and gallbladder assists in digestion of fats, breaking them into micelles.

• Bicarbonate ions from the pancreas neutralize the pH of the chyme entering from the stomach to
produce an environment conducive to pancreatic enzyme action.

• Final enzymatic cleavage of peptides and disaccharides occurs on the cell surfaces of the intestinal
mucosa.

• Amino acids, monosaccharides, and many inorganic ions are absorbed by the microvilli of the
mucosal cells.

• Often specific carrier proteins in the membranes of these cells transport nutrients into the cells.

• Sodium cotransport is a common mechanism for actively absorbing nutrient molecules and ions.

• Fats are absorbed mostly as monoglycerides and fatty acids, the product of lipase action on
triglycerides in food.

• These products pass through mucosal cell membranes and are resynthesized into triglycerides
within the cells.

• The triglycerides are combined with cholesterol and coated with protein to form chylomicrons,
which pass out of mucosal cells into lymphatic vessels in the submucosa.

• Water and ions are absorbed in the large intestine so that waste matter is consolidated into feces.

• In herbivores such as rabbits and ruminants, some compartments of the gut have populations of
microorganisms that aid in digesting molecules otherwise indigestible.
• Control and Regulation of Digestion
• Digestion processes are coordinated and controlled by neural and hormonal mechanisms.

• Salivation and swallowing are autonomic reflexes.

• Stomach and small intestine actions are largely controlled by the hormones gastrin, secretin, and
cholecystokinin.

• Control and Regulation of Fuel Metabolism

• The liver interconverts fuel molecules and plays a central role in directing their traffic.

• When food is being absorbed from the gut, the liver takes up and stores fats and carbohydrates,
converting monosaccharides to glycogen or fat.

• The liver also takes up amino acids and uses them to produce blood plasma proteins.

• Fat and cholesterol are shipped out of the liver as low-density lipoproteins.

• High-density lipoproteins act as acceptors of cholesterol and are believed to bring fat and
cholesterol back to the liver.

• Fuel metabolism during the absorptive period is controlled largely by insulin, which promotes
glucose uptake and utilization by most cells of the body, as well as fat synthesis in adipose tissue.

• During the postabsorptive period, lack of insulin blocks the uptake and utilization of glucose by
most body cells except neurons.

• If blood glucose levels fall, glucagon is secreted, stimulating the liver to break down glycogen to
release glucose.

• The Regulation of Food Intake

• Food intake is governed by sensations of hunger and satiety determined by brain mechanisms.

• When one hypothalamic region is damaged, rats eat more; when another region is damaged, they eat less.

• A number of molecules provide feedback information to these brain areas.

• Leptin is a hormone produced by fat cells that inhibits food intake.

• Toxic Compounds in Food

• Even natural plant and animal foods can contain toxic compounds.

• Human activities such as pesticide use and pollution of environment have made the problem of toxins in
food worse.

• An organism can accumulate toxic compounds in its body, especially if those compounds are lipid-soluble or
take the structural place of a natural molecule.

• Toxins such as PCBs and DDT that accumulate in the bodies of prey are transferred to and further
concentrated in the bodies of their predators.

• This bioaccumulation produces high concentrations of toxins in animals high up the food chain.