Vitamin C,?: What Is Vitamin C?

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What is Vitamin C? According to Witney and Rolfes 2012, Vitamin C is a water-soluble vitamin that is necessary for normal growth and development. Water-soluble vitamins dissolve in water and leftover amounts of the vitamin leave the body through the urine. Hence the reasons why we need a continuous supply of this vitamin our diet. Vitamin C in humans must be ingested for survival. It is an electron donor, and this property accounts for all its known functions. As an electron donor, vitamin C is a potent water-soluble antioxidant in humans.
The Role of Vitamin C Vitamin C in the body acts as an antioxidant. Vitamin C loses electrons easily, a characteristic that allows it to perform as an antioxidant. In the body, antioxidants defend against free radicals. A free radical is a molecule with one or more unpaired electrons, which makes it unstable and highly reactive. By donating an electron or two, antioxidants neutralize free radicals and protect other substances from their damage. Figure 1 illustrates how vitamin C can give up electrons to stop free radical damage and then accept them again to become reactivated. This recycling of vitamin C is key to limiting losses and maintaining a reserve of …show more content…

The gums bleed easily around the teeth, and capillaries under the skin break spontaneously, producing pinpoint hemorrhages. When vitamin C concentrations fall to about a fifth of optimal levels, scurvy symptoms begin to appear. Inadequate collagen synthesis causes further hemorrhaging. Muscles, including the heart muscle, degenerate. The skin becomes rough, brown, scaly, and dry. Wounds fail to heal because scar tissue will not form. Bone rebuilding falters; the ends of the long bones become softened, malformed, and painful, and fractures develop. The teeth become loose as the cartilage around them

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