If recent findings about a Benzothiazepine test are to be believed, sportsmen who cheat with steroids or performance enhancing compounds to gain an unfair advantage over their peers will have a tough time as the chances of them being caught by the doping bodies have increased because of a futuristic Benzothiazepine test.
In the past, doping tests have always been developed after a drug, steroid, or performance enhancing compound was known to be in the circulation. But things may change after the new Benzothiazepine test, which is aimed to catch sports cheat by observing a futuristic approach.
From News-Medical.Net:
On the face of it, the Beijing Olympics were remarkably drug free with only six athletes being caught during the games and three further suspect cases identified after the games closed. Rumours suggest that many athletes were in fact using performance-enhancing drugs that could not be detected using standard tests. One possibility is that some athletes were using compounds that have not yet been tested in humans, but have shown performance enhancing properties in animal trials. Because these compounds are in the early stage of development no test has been developed, so their use will go undetected.
A new test, announced in the launch issue of the new journal, Drug Testing and Analysis, will help sports officials stay one step ahead of the game by allowing them to screen for some of these emerging drugs, as well as others in the same class that have not yet reached the market.
The test detects a core chemical structure belonging to a class of compounds called benzothiazepines. These compounds stabilise protein channels that would otherwise “leak” calcium from muscle cells during strenuous exercise. Calcium is needed for muscle contraction and this “leaking” effect weakens the contractions and is a causal factor in muscle fatigue.
JTV-519 and S-107, benzothiazepines currently in development for the treatment of heart abnormalities, are known to increase endurance in mice. Although they have not yet entered human clinical trials, both can be detected using the test.
Mario Thevis, Director of the Center for Preventive Doping Research at the German Sport University of Cologne, Germany said that as soon as these drugs (JTV-519 and S-107, benzothiazepines) enter the stage of human clinical trial, there would be a huge potential for them to be used inappropriately by sportsmen to gain an unfair advantage.
The fact that steroids and sports have become a popular relationship among sportsmen has always been a bone of contention between people who advocate steroid use and those who do not.
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