Carbohydrate digestion in GI tract

stomach

mouth to stomach Carbohydrate digestion ceases in the stomach . The activity of salivary amylase diminishes as the stomach's acid and protein-digesting enzymes inactivate the enzyme. The stomach's digestive juices contain no enzymes to break down carbohydrates. Fibers are not digested, but because they linger in the stomach, they delay gastric emptying, thereby providing a feeling of fullness and satiety

small intestine

mouth to stomach to small intestine The small intestine performs most of the work of carbohydrate digestion. A major carbohydrate-digesting enzyme, pancreatic amylase, enters the intestine via the pancreatic duct and continues breaking down the polysaccharides to shorter glucose chains and maltose. The final step takes place on the outer membranes of the intestinal cells. There specific enzymes break down specific disaccharides Fibers is not digested and it delays absorption of other nutrients

In the Large Intestine

mouth to stomach to small intestine to large intestine Most fiber passes intact through the digestive tract to the large intestine. Bacterial enzymes break the fiber into short chain fatty acid gas. Fiber holds water ; regulates bowel activity and binds substances such as bile and cholesterol and some minerals carrying them out of body Within 1 to 4 hours after a meal, all the sugars and most of the starches have been digested. Only the nondigestible carbohydrates remain in the digestive tract

mouth

The salivary enzyme amylase (AM-ih-lace) starts to work in the mouth, hydrolyzing starch to shorter polysaccharides and to the disaccharide maltose. Because food is in the mouth for a relatively short time, very little carbohydrate digestion takes place there.