As a wholefood, all the vitamins and minerals Yaeyama Chlorella contains are present in their natural forms - as nature intended. This means that nutritional uptake is optimised, giving benefits far beyond those of the majority of commercial supplements that have been synthetically engineered:

• The majority of commercial vitamin supplements are made up of synthetic vitamins
• Synthetic vitamins do not perform the same functions in your body as vitamins found naturally in whole food
• Many synthetic vitamins deplete your body of other nutrients and tax your kidneys before being excreted through your urine

If you want a comprehensive understanding of what vitamins are and what they do in your body, it would be best to take a full course in biochemistry. Do you remember all of those molecular formulas and chemical reactions that you studied in your school chemistry class? Biochemistry is really just an extension of chemistry, with an emphasis on the thousands of chemical reactions that occur in your body on a moment-to-moment basis.

Anyone who studies biochemistry learns that vitamins do not exist as single components that act on their own. Vitamins are made up of several different components – enzymes, co-enzymes, and co-factors – that must work together to produce their intended biologic effects.

Vitamins that are found naturally in wholefoods come with all of their necessary components.

The majority of vitamins that are sold in pharmacies, grocery stores, and vitamin shops are synthetic vitamins, which are only isolated portions of the vitamins that occur naturally in food.

A good example is vitamin C. If you take a look at a variety of vitamin C supplements, you will find that the majority of them contain only ascorbic acid or a compound called ascorbate, which is a less acidic form of acorbic acid. Ascorbic acid is NOT vitamin C. It represents the outer ring that serves as a protective shell for the entire vitamin C complex, much like an orange peel that serves as a protective shell for an orange.

Real vitamin C found in whole foods like fruits and vegetables contain the following components:

• Rutin
• Bioflavonoids (vitamin P)
• Factor K
• Factor J
• Factor P
• Tyrosinase
• Ascorbinogen
• Ascorbic Acid

When you take only ascorbic acid found in your synthetic vitamin C tablet or powder, your body must gather all of the other components of the full vitamin C complex from your body’s tissues in order to make use of it. In the event that your body does not have adequate reserves of the other components, ascorbic acid itself does not provide any of the health benefits that the full vitamin C complex does. After circulating through your system, the unused ascorbic acid is eliminated through your urine.

Just like vitamin C, almost all other vitamins that we know of offer their full health benefits when they are in the presence of a number of enzymes, co-enzymes, co-factors, and even minerals. For example, Vitamin D may have as many as twelve different active components, while vitamin P has at least five different components. The mineral copper is needed for full vitamin C activity, while vitamin E works closely with the mineral selenium to provide its health promoting, anti-oxidative effect.

Clearly, it is best to get your vitamins from wholefoods because wholefoods provide complete vitamins rather than fractions of them. In many cases, wholefoods also provide the minerals that are necessary for optimal vitamin activity. For example, sunflower seeds are an excellent whole food source of vitamin E and the mineral selenium, both of which need each other to offer their full health benefits. As a wholefood Chlorella contains such complete vitamins and minerals needed for optimal uptake.

While some synthetic and isolated vitamins have been shown to provide minimal health benefits, on the whole, most of them cause more harm than good and you are far better off spending your money on whole foods.

It is important to note that the principles in this article are just as relevant and applicable to minerals and mineral supplements.