Bile is secreted by the liver.
Bile is a yellowish juice that is secreted by the liver of vertebrates. It is a liquid substance that acts in digestion , acting as an emulsifier for fatty acids.
You have to go to Latin if you want to find the etymological origin of the term that concerns us now. When performing this operation we come across the fact that it emanates from the word bile , which can be translated as “hepatic type secretion” .
Composition of bile
Bile is made up of 97% water , with the remaining 3% made up of bile salts (such as sodium taurocholate and sodium glycocholate), proteins, cholesterol, and hormones.
The liver is responsible for secreting bile continuously: this bile is used in the digestive process or is stored in the gallbladder. Bile production in humans is approximately one liter per day.
Its usefulness
When you eat, bile leaves this vesicle and reaches the intestine, where it mixes with the fats in the food. Fats are dissolved by bile acids and become part of the contents of the intestine. Once dissolved, the enzymes of the pancreas and intestinal mucosa are responsible for digesting the fats.
This means that bile helps fats be absorbed by the small intestine and is therefore necessary for the absorption of fat-soluble vitamins (vitamins A , D , E and K ).
Bile also helps excrete bilirubin , neutralizes excess stomach acids, eliminates microbes that enter the body with food, and is a detoxifier for excess alcohol and certain drugs.
Among the disorders linked to bile, there is the possible formation of gallstones (when cholesterol accumulates in masses of the gallbladder) and problems in the intestine generated by the lack of bile (since fats, not being digested, excreted).
Lack of bile causes intestinal problems.
Expressions with the term bile
There are various terms that are used in different countries, also resorting to the word in question. Thus, for example, in Mexico it is common to use the expression spilled bile . What it tries to express with it is the difficult situation in which a person finds themselves as a result of an excess of that aforementioned secretion.
On the other hand, there is the so-called vitelline bile . This is the one that is identified because it has a very dark yellow color.
All this without forgetting that there is atrabilis , also called black bile . This is a term used and created in the field of Medicine by Galen and Hippocrates who defined it as one of the four basic humors that existed in every organism.
In addition to all of the above, we cannot ignore the fact that on a daily basis, colloquially, we resort to the use of expressions that use the term we are analyzing. A good example of this is the expression “alterarsele la bile” , which is used to say that a person in question is angry. An example of this meaning would be the following sentence: “Eva's bile changed when she saw her ex-boyfriend holding hands with another woman.”