Fecal matter

Feces (also known as faeces fæces; faex) are the solid or semi-solid remains of food that was not digested in the small intestine and has been broken down by bacteria in the large intestine. Feces contain a relatively small amount of metabolic waste products, such as bacterially altered bilirubin and dead epithelial cells from the lining of the gut.

Feces are discharged through the anus or cloaca during defecation.

Feces can be used as fertilizer or soil conditioner in agriculture. They can also be burned as fuel or dried and used for construction. Some medicinal uses have been found. In the case of human feces, fecal transplants or fecal bacteriotherapy are in use. Urine and feces together are called excreta.

Characteristics

Hydrogen sulfide contributes to the odor of feces. The distinctive rotten egg smell of feces is due to skatole, thiols (sulfur-containing compounds), amines, and carboxylic acids. Skatole is produced from tryptophan through indoleacetic acid. Decarboxylation produces skatole.

The perceived bad odor of feces has been hypothesized to deter humans, as consuming or touching it may result in sickness or infection.

Ecology

After an animal has digested and eaten material, the remains of that material are discharged from its body as waste. Although it is lower in energy than the food from which it is derived, feces may retain a large amount of energy, often 50% of that of the original food. This means that of all food eaten, a significant amount of energy remains for the decomposers of ecosystems.

Many organisms feed on feces, from bacteria to fungi to insects such as dung beetles, which can sense odors from long distances. Some may specialize in feces, while others may eat other foods. Feces serve not only as an essential food, but also as a supplement to the usual diet of some animals. This process is known as coprophagia. It occurs in various animal species, such as young elephants eating the feces of their mothers to gain essential gut flora, or by other animals such as dogs, rabbits, and monkeys.

Feces and urine, which reflect ultraviolet light, are important to raptors such as kestrels, who can see the near ultraviolet and thus find their prey by their middens and other territorial markers.

Seeds also may be found in feces. Animals that eat fruit are known as frugivores. An advantage of having fruit for a plant is that animals will eat the fruit and unknowingly disperse the seed. This mode of seed dispersal is highly successful, as seeds dispersed around the base of a plant are unlikely to succeed and often are subject to heavy predation. If the seed can withstand the pathway through the digestive system, it is likely to be far away from the parent plant and be provided with its own fertilizer.

Organisms that feed on dead organic matter, or "detritus, " are known as detritivores and play a crucial role in ecosystems by recycling organic matter back into a simpler form that plants and other autotrophs can absorb once again. This cycle of matter is referred to as the biogeochemical cycle. To maintain nutrients in soil, it is essential that feces return to the area from which they originated. However, this is not always the case in human society, where food may be transported from rural areas to urban populations, and feces are sometimes disposed of into a river or sea.

Human feces

Depending on the individual and the circumstances, humans may defecate several times daily, every day, or once every two or three days. Extensive hardening of the feces that interrupts this routine for several days or more is called constipation.

The appearance of human fecal matter varies according to diet and health. Typically, it is semisolid and has a mucus coating. A combination of bile and bilirubin, which originates from dead red blood cells, gives feces their typical brown color.

After the meconium, the first stool expelled, a newborn's feces contains only bile, which gives it a yellow-green color. Breastfeeding babies expel soft, pale yellowish, and not particularly malodorous matter; however, once the baby begins to eat and the body starts expelling bilirubin from dead red blood cells, the stool acquires the familiar brown color.

At various stages of life, humans will expel feces of different colors and textures. A stool that moves quickly through the intestines will appear greenish; a lack of bilirubin will cause the stool to resemble clay.

Articles relating to animal feces

Wikipedia article: fecal matter

Coprolites and paleofeces

A coprolite is fossilized feces and is classified as a trace fossil. In paleontology, they provide evidence about the diet of an animal. They were first described by William Buckland in 1829. Before this, they were referred to as "fossil fir cones" and "bezoar stones. " They serve a valuable purpose in paleontology because they provide direct evidence of the predation and diet of extinct organisms. Coprolites may range in size from a few millimeters to more than 60 centimetres.

Palaeofeces are ancient human feces, often discovered during archaeological excavations or surveys. Intact paleofeces of ancient peoples may be found in caves located in arid climates and in other areas with suitable preservation conditions. Researchers study these samples to determine the diet and health of the individuals who produced them by analyzing seeds, small bones, and parasite eggs contained within. Feces may reveal information about the person excreting the material as well as details about the material itself. Additionally, they can be chemically analyzed for more in-depth insights into the individual who excreted them, using lipid analysis and ancient DNA analysis. The success rate of usable DNA extraction is relatively high in paleofeces, making it more reliable than skeletal DNA retrieval.

The reason this analysis is possible at all is that the digestive system is not entirely efficient; not everything passing through it is completely destroyed. While not all of the remaining material is recognizable, some of it is. Generally, this material serves as the best indicator archaeologists can use to determine ancient diets, as no other part of the archaeological record provides such a direct indicator.

A process that preserves feces for later analysis is the Maillard reaction ^↗. This reaction creates a sugar casing that protects the feces from environmental elements. To extract and analyze the information contained within, researchers typically freeze the feces and grind it into powder for analysis.

Other uses

• Kopi luwak, also known as civet coffee, is made from coffee beans that have been consumed and excreted by Asian palm civets (Paradoxurus hermaphroditus).
• Giant pandas provide fertilizer for the world's most expensive green tea.
• In Malaysia, tea is made from the droppings of stick insects fed on guava leaves.
• In northern Thailand, elephants are used to digest coffee beans in order to make Black Ivory coffee, which is among the world's most expensive coffees.
• Paper is also made from elephant dung in Thailand. This brand of paper is called Haathi Chaap.
• Dog feces was used in the tanning process of leather during the Victorian era. Collected dog feces, known as "pure", "puer", or "power", were mixed with water to form a substance known as "bate", because proteolytic enzymes in the dog feces helped to relax the fibrous structure of the hide before the final stages of tanning. Dog feces collectors were known as pure finders.
• Elephants, hippopotamai, koalas, and pandas are born with sterile intestines, and require bacteria obtained from eating the feces of their mothers to digest vegetation.
• In India, cow dung and cow urine are major ingredients of the traditional Hindu drink Panchagavya. Indian politician Shankarbhai Vegad stated that they can cure cancer.

Terminology

Feces is the scientific terminology, while stool is also commonly used in medical contexts. Outside of scientific contexts, these terms are less common, with the most common layman's term being poop or poo. The term shit is also in everyday use, although it is widely considered vulgar or offensive. There are many other terms, see below.

Etymology

The word "faeces" is the plural of the Latin word " faex, " meaning "dregs. " In most English-language usage, there is no singular form, making the word a plurale tantum. Out of various major dictionaries, only one presents a variation from plural agreement.

Synonyms

The term "feces" is more commonly used in biology and medicine than in other fields, reflecting the tradition of classical Latin and Neo-Latin in science. In hunting and tracking, terms such as "dung, " "scat, " "spoor, " and "droppings" are typically used to refer to non-human animal feces. In husbandry and farming, " manure " is a common term. The word " stool " is commonly used in reference to human feces. For example, in medicine, a stool sample may be requested to diagnose the presence or absence of a medical condition. The term "bowel movement(s)" is also frequently used in health care, with each movement representing a defecation event.

There are many synonyms in informal registers for feces, just like there are for urine. Many are euphemisms, colloquial, or both; some are profane (such as shit), whereas most belong chiefly to child-directed speech) or tocrude humor (such as crap, dump, load and turd.

Feces of animals

The feces of animals often have special names (some of them are slang), for example:

• Non-human animals
  • As bulk material – dung
  • Individually – droppings
• Cattle
  • Bulk material – cow dung
  • Individual droppings – cow pats, meadow muffins, etc.
• Deer (and formerly other quarry animals) – fewmets
• Wild carnivores – scat
• Otter – spraint
• Birds (individual) – droppings (also include urine as white crystals of uric acid)
• Seabirds or bats (large accumulations) – guano
• Herbivorous insects, such as caterpillars and leaf beetles – frass
• Earthworms, lugworms etc. – worm castings (feces extruded at ground surface)
• Feces when used as fertilizer (usually mixed with animal bedding and urine) – manure
• Horses – horse manure, roadapple (before motor vehicles became common, horse droppings were a big part of the rubbish communities needed to clean off roads)

Society and culture

Feelings of disgust

In all human cultures, feces elicit varying degrees of disgust in adults. Children under two years typically have no disgust response to it, suggesting it is culturally derived. Disgust toward feces appears to be strongest in cultures where flush toilets make olfactory contact with human feces minimal. Disgust is experienced primarily concerning the sense of taste (perceived or imagined) and, secondarily, anything that causes a similar feeling by sense of smell, touch, or vision.

Jokes

Poop is the center of toilet humor, and is commonly an interest of young children and teenagers.

References

• Article on Feces – MedFriendly

More information is available at [ Wikipedia:Fecal_matter ]

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