Vitamin C is a remarkably versatile nutrient. It plays a significant role in a wide range of different systems and processes throughout your body, from helping repair wounds and injuries to strengthening the adrenals when you’re under stress.

Vitamin C plays a huge part in many different functions. However, this vitamin is best known as the immunity superstar–and there is a good reason for the association. Vitamin C–has been shown to support a large number of immune mechanisms in your body. For instance, the white blood cell, which is an important part of your immune system, helps fight off illness-causing viruses and bacteria in a different way with Vitamin C, helping to stimulate both the production and function of many of these types of white blood cells. It also helps the body to produce important antibodies: proteins that bind invading microbes to neutralize them.

Vitamin C’s powerful antioxidant properties help protect certain white blood cells from the toxic compounds they produce in their fight against pathogens. In other words, Vitamin C is an essential nutrient for healthy immune system response. However, your immune system isn’t a simple set of cells functioning in isolation from anything else. Instead, it’s a complex network of interconnected organs, cells and processes.

What’s more, several of your body’s other functions affect how well your immune system can do its job, and Vitamin C plays a role in several of these functions too. For example, your skin and mucous membranes are your body’s first line of defences.

A cut or puncture in your skin can become a gateway for infection-causing bacteria, and Vitamin C helps your body produce collagen – a key protein in skin, and one you need for proper wound healing. Likewise, the adrenal glands have a vital function to play in the body’s reaction to stress. They use a significant amount of Vitamin C every time a stress response is triggered. This is why Vitamin C is key for a strong and well-functioning immune.

Here’s how it helps the immune system: