The motion of the stomach walls and the consequent emptying into the intestines is affected by many disease conditions. Gastroparesis (slow emptying into intestines) is a disorder that can arise on its own or as a complication of diabetes. Antibiotics (like Erythromycin) and Parkinson’s disease can also alter the stomach wall motion. The consequences of these alterations for gastric mixing and digestion remain poorly understood, mainly because it is challenging to measure these things in-vivo.
Our recent paper quantifies these consequences using a computational model based on MRI data. We have modeled the digestion of a liquid meal containing protein for a healthy case and other cases with reduced wall motion. The novelty of the work lies in combining fluid mechanics with the chemistry of protein hydrolysis and simulating durations comparable to actual digestion times. The findings show that reduced stomach motility can not only slow down emptying but also lead to significantly poorer mixing and protein hydrolysis.
The published paper can be found at: https://doi.org/10.1063/5.0120933
Sharun Kuhar, Jae Ho (Mike) Lee, Jung Hee Seo, Pankaj Jay Pasricha, Rajat Mittal. Effect of stomach motility on food hydrolysis and gastric emptying: Insight from computational models. Physics of Fluids 34, 111909 (2022).