Did you know that your skin stores Vitamin C? Vitamin C actually helps rejuvenate and protect your complexion regardless of if your body sources it from food or if its applied topically. Vitamin C should be part of your skincare regimen, whether it be your daily cleanser or your daily moisturizer.
When your body gets vitamin C, the benefits are extremely beneficial.
Vitamin C Helps to Prevent Sun Damage:
UV light is harmful to the skin, because upon contact, damaging molecules called free radicals attack cells and collagen. The result of prolonged UV exposure can cause inflammation, leading to wrinkles, sun spots and even skin cancer. A potent antioxidant, vitamin C mitigates free radicals before they cause substantial damage and reduces inflammation, neutralizing its effects. Research has shown that women with the highest dietary intake of vitamin C had fewer noticeable wrinkles and less dryness.
Stronger Healthier Skin:
Along with minimizing the appearance of fine lines, vitamin C also helps the surface of your skin appear smoother and firmer by activating cells called fibroblasts that generate new collagen.
Skin Rejuvenation:
Vitamin C helps repair damaged skin after scarring and cuts to the skin. The vitamin may also play a role in the formation of keratinocytes; which are the cells needed to close up a wound on the skin’s surface. While increasing your vitamin C intake does not appear to speed up the repair process, not getting enough may delay healing.
Antioxidant Protection:
As with dietary vitamin C, topical application of vitamin c also provides your skin with protective antioxidants that fight free radical damage and inflammation caused by the sun, pollution and other factors. The key is using a product that has the L-ascorbic acid form of vitamin C—the only one that can penetrate the deep layers of your skin. While using sunscreen is still the best way to prevent burns and the aging effects of UV light, rubbing in a vitamin C-containing serum or lotion underneath delivers extra insurance by counteracting the small percentage of UV rays that can sneak through sunblock.
Topical vitamin C promotes collagen production by counteracting fibroblasts, which helps improve the appearance of fine lines. Research indicates that Vitamin C may also help reduce the speed at which collagen breakdowns consequentially preserving skin’s structure. Researchers have been able to show the effects of using vitamin C externally: When participants in a 12-week study applied a vitamin C product to half of their face and the same product without the nutrient to the other half the researchers found a significant visible improvement on the side given the vitamin, including a decrease in wrinkles.
L-ascorbic acid has also been shown to slow the overproduction of pigment, called melanin; which long term application can lighten brown spots, also referred to as hyperpigmentation.
