Antioxidants. Chances are, you’ve heard this term thousands of times because of their importance to overall health. Given the broad (and possibly overwhelming) selection on the market, it may be tough to figure out how to select the best antioxidant supplements to add to your daily regimen. Here’s where vitamin C comes in. You’ve certainly heard of it before; you probably even know that oranges are full of it. But, do you fully understand how this antioxidant powerhouse works and why you need it?

The Antioxidant Factor
Even in small amounts, vitamin C can protect indispensable molecules in the body such as proteins, lipids (fats), carbohydrates and nucleic acids (DNA and RNA) from damage by free radicals that can be generated during normal metabolism as well as through exposure to toxins and pollutants (1). Free radicals, by the way, are highly unstable atoms with unpaired electrons in their outer shells. For the non-chemists among us, that means these...