Natural Vitamin CversusSynthetic Vitamin C
What is the Natural Vitamin C?
Except of human and some other organisms, most of the plants and animals can synthesize Vitamin C by their own. All of the self producing organisms are sources for natural Vitamin C. When you eat plants or animals, your body receives natural Vitamin C.
What is Ascorbic acid?
In 1907 scientists noticed that fresh foods could prevent and treat Scurvy disease. In 1928, Albert Szent-Gyorgyi isolated a compound from plant and animal extracts which could help curing Scurvy as well. He called it as "Hexuronic acid".
In 1932, Walter Hawolt determined the molecular structure of Hexuronic acid and renamed it as "Ascorbic acid".
Ascorbic acid is an organic acid. Its chemical formula is C6H8O6
.
What is the synthetic vitamin C ?
After identification of the chemical structure of natural Vitamin C in 1932 by Hawolt, he synthesized it two years later in 1934. He named it as Ascorbic acid, due to its healing effect on scorbut (Scurvy) disease.
Today almost all of the Vitamin C in the pharmaceutical market is made of synthetic ascorbic acid, because it is cheaper than natural Vitamin C.
Are Vitamin C and Ascorbic acid identical ?
Yes! Ascorbic acid is another name for Vitamin C. It was isolated from fresh plants extract and could help treating Scurvy symptoms. Scurvy is the most serious and obvious form of Vitamin C deficiency. Ascorbic acid has two forms: D and L.
D form's crystals turn light to right (Dextrorotatory) and L form turns to left (laevorotatory).
The natural form of ascorbic acid is L form (L-Ascorbic acid). In chemical synthesis, both of D and L forms are produced and then are isolated from each other.
Natural Vitamin C versus Synthetic Ascorbic acid:
As it is mentioned in the former question, Vitamin C and Ascorbic acid are identical. The new question is: If they are identical, can we use synthetic ascorbic acid for Vitamin C supply?
The answer is: Yes! but there are some differences between a nature made product and its chemical synthesized copy.
The nature made Vitamin C has the best 3D structure it could have! because the synthesis of Vitamin C in the living organisms is done by enzymes. Enzymes are very sensitive even to the 3D structure of the product.
In the chemical synthesis, the procedure is not specific as enzymatic biosynthesis and it is needed to isolate different variants and impurities after synthesis. The purification step is not 100 percent perfect and some derivatives and primary chemicals are still exist in the final product. This traces of impurities could be hazardous if you take them in a daily basis (remember that you need to take Vitamin C everyday!).
In the other hand, when you are taking a plant extract as a Natural source of Vitamin C, there are also some other molecules beside of the Vitamin C. These molecules may help Vitamin C to have a better performance. They may be important in Vitamin C metabolism as well.
Remember, Nature could not be mimicked perfectly, think about thousands of examples, Vitamin C is not an exception. Take natural Vitamin C, it has more benefits and is safer.
Why is the synthetic Ascorbic acid sold as Vitamin C ?
Most of the Vitamin C in the market is made of synthetic Ascorbic acid. It is enough to take a look at "Nutritional facts label" of a Vitamin C supplement ingredients.
The most important reason is the "COST"! Yes! synthetic Ascorbic acid is terribly cheap. The cost of 99% Pure, made in China, high quality Ascorbic acid is about 3 $ per kilogram! It makes a good profit margin for the manufacturers and so most of them are using synthetic Ascorbic acid in their Vitamin C products.
How can you determine a supplement has natural Vitamin C or synthetic ascorbic acid?
A) from the source of the Vitamin C
It is so simple! because supplements manufacturers should determine the ingredients of their product on the product label. Take a look at the product label, there is a part describing the ingredients, amounts, and probably % of Daily Value. If there was written "Vitamin C" or "Ascorbic acid" without any description of its source, it means it is synthetic! The natural Vitamin C supplements always mention the source of the Vitamin C, for example: "Vitamin C from Acerola" or "Vitamin C from berries".
> some of the brands may have a combination of Natural and synthetic Vitamin C.
> Be advised that "Natural flavored" or "with natural citrus flavor" is not defining a natural Vitamin C supplement.
B) Vitamin C content
The Vitamin C content of the natural sources of Vitamin C is less than 30%. However, the purity of the synthetic Vitamin C is about 99% and so, formulation of capsules or tablets with 500 or 1000 mg of Vitamin C is not possible by using a natural source of Vitamin C! The synthetic Vitamin C supplements claim higher amounts of Vitamin C on their labels.
How synthetic Ascorbic acid is manufactured?
There are some methods for synthetic ascorbic acid. Some are completely chemically, but some others are using biotechnology and chemical synthesis. The second type methods are better because are using less hazardous chemicals. Most of the synthetic ascorbic acid is manufactured using the second method.