Modelling of physical and chemical processes in the small intestine

The chemical and physical processing of food in the small intestine is an important step for digestion. If foods are to be designed in the future to control digestion for impact on obesity and other dietary related chronic diseases, it is important to have realistic models of the processes that occur throughout the human gastrointestinal tract (GI tract). These models need to include how the food structure and viscosity affects enzyme reaction, how they impact on materials getting to the GI tract wall, how this affects the availability of the nutrients and how the flow patterns in the different parts of the GI tract impact on the food behaviour and breakdown.