Vitamin D helps the skin heal, boosts immune function and protects against microbes: NewsTarget.com

Being out in the sun can help boost your immune system as it tries to heal wounds, a recent study by the University of California-San Diego School of Medicine shows. The key is a healthy level of vitamin D3, generated from UV irradiation in sunlight.

Study researcher Richard L. Gallo, M.D., Ph.D., said that wounds cause the immune system within skin cells to call up an increased production of vitamin D3. The genes controlled by vitamin D3 then promote further creation of an antimicrobial peptide called cathelicidin that the immune system uses to fight infections.

"Our study shows that skin wounds need vitamin D3 to protect against infection and begin the normal repair process," Gallo said in a UCSD press release. "A deficiency in active D3 may compromise the body's innate immune system which works to resist infection, making a patient more vulnerable to microbes."

Gallo is the chief of UCSD's Division of Dermatology and the dermatology section of the Veterans Affairs San Diego Healthcare System.

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Vitamin D helps the skin heal, boosts immune function and protects against microbes

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