The future of cheating in sports...

[Mik 0]

This might sound crazy - but speaking as a biochemist I think they can actually accomplish what they are setting out to do. It may cause wild unpredicted side effects, but the genes in question could certainly be manipulated.

 

 

LA JOLLA, Calif. -- In the laboratory of the Salk Institute for Biological Studies is a gray mouse called Lance, so named because he just goes and goes and goes, like perennial Tour de France champion Lance Armstrong. He is among dozens of furry, little rodents that were genetically engineered to run twice as far on a treadmill as normal mice.

 

Lance asks no questions, but begs many.

 

Like, could gene doping, should it move from mice to men, end sport as we know it?

 

To those familiar with inserting genes into living organisms, this is no hysterical scenario.

 

"We can engineer almost any gene and any trait in the mouse permanently as we did with the marathon mice in this study," says Dr. Ronald Evans, a molecular investigator at the institute. "It is basically a mechanical process that could be done almost in any species. That's for sure."

 

In his office on a bluff overlooking the Pacific Ocean, Evans hands over a copy of an eight-page study published in October showing how his team of scientists was able to endow Lance and other mice with high levels of slow-twitch endurance muscle. By adjusting the characteristics of embryos, they were able to grow mice that burned fat and stayed in shape -- even without exercise.

 

Separately, fully grown normal mice were given a drug that changed their genetic structure. In them, Evans is finding many of the same results as with the engineered mice.

 

Founded by Jonas Salk, pioneer of the polio vaccine, the Salk Institute exists to address diseases and human conditions such as obesity. But as with all research into genetics and physical performance, the results can -- and probably will -- be used by athletes.

 

"I am 99 percent sure that athletes will give it a try," Evans says.

 

Evans is confident that gene doping is the future of sports because he already has heard from horse trainers and pro athletes who want access to the same drug used on the mice. They want Dr. Evans to be their Dr. Frankenstein.

 

Across the country at the University of Pennsylvania, Lee Sweeney gets even more of these public inquiries than Evans. He has succeeded in buffing up mice with fast-twitch, power-based muscle, the type of fiber found in successful athletes in such popular American sports as football, baseball and basketball. They came to be called Schwarzenegger mice.

 

"I've gotten so many e-mails with 'potential guinea pig' or 'I want to be your guinea pig' or 'try it on me' as the byline," says Sweeney, a physiologist. "I even had a couple of coaches contact me early on, which was pretty funny. One high school football coach wanted me to treat his entire team."

 

Given a drug that includes the gene Insulin Growth Factor 1, or IGF1, Sweeney's rodents were twice as strong as normal mice. And the drug made the muscle more resistant to injury. The finding has potentially profound implications for athletes.

 

"It'll extend the life of someone in a power or strength sport in terms of the age at which they would be competitive," Sweeney says. "Some of these treatments basically stop a lot of aging changes in muscle performance and keep them at a young adult peak throughout much of their lives.

 

"If Barry Bonds would have been able to be treated in this manner then I think that [top] performance for him even a decade out from now would still be possible."

 

Think of gene doping as steroids on steroids.

 

"It's not just adding some drugs to the pile," says Richard Pound, director of the World Anti-Doping Agency. "I mean, you're down there tinkering with the genetic makeup of a human being. That's scary stuff if you don't control it."

 

There is no evidence that any athletes have used gene doping. But neither is there any way to detect such usage right now. Convinced that gene doping could arrive by the Beijing Olympics in 2008, if it is not here already in some clandestine manner, WADA already is trying to understand how it can test for the manipulation of genes.

 

When the concept of gene doping first arose earlier in the decade, the sense among scientists was that it would be the perfect crime: powerful and yet undetectable by the machinery used to catch modern drug cheats. Unlike steroids and human growth hormone, gene doping involves the switching on or off of genetic levers that produce natural chemicals.

 

But now there is hope that the testers can identify gene dopers by looking for side effects from drugs in blood samples.

 

"When you administer a substance, your body will react to a change," said Dr. Olivier Rabin, WADA chief scientist. "There will be some genes internally which are going to be turned 'up' and others are going to be turned 'down.' We want to map those genes to be able to say, 'OK now, there are three or four genes that are really increased in their activities, while others are decreased.' "

 

Yet, the human genome consists of upward of 30,000 genes. Geneticists speculate that at least a couple hundred of those contribute in some meaningful way to athleticism. Coming to understand the side effects of the various potential forms of genetic doping is acknowledged by scientists in the field as an enormous task.

 

Just as challenging are the ethical conundrums. There is no bright line between gene doping and gene therapy, which is the use of drugs to address disease. So far, gene therapy has been problematic, with some subjects in clinical trials even dying. But scientists expect that as medicines are perfected, the public will have access to tailored drugs designed to adjust their genes.

 

Already, the drug-maker Glaxo is testing in humans a pill that activates the same protein responsible for the endurance feats of Evans' mice. Another large pharmaceutical manufacturer, Wyeth, is conducting clinical trials on a drug that would block the production of a hormone called myostatin, the absence of which allows Belgian Blue Cattle to grow huge muscles. These drugs could be available by the end of the decade, if they prove safe and effective.

 

"It would be absolutely wrong to deprive athletes of the therapeutic uses of genes and gene transfer and gene therapy for injuries," said Dr. Theodore Friedmann, director of the gene therapy program at the University of California-San Diego. "On the other hand, it removes the last vestiges of that romantic view of sport of overcoming sort of physical obstacles to achieve something."

 

Some scientists wonder how much gene doping could add to the cheaters' toolbox. After all, Jason Giambi's tendons can only support so much red meat. "There have been phenomenal gains from the use of growth hormone, testosterone and EPO," says David Martin, a physiologist who trains with Australian Olympians at the Australian Institute of Sport.

 

Charles Yesalis is not among the hopeful. A Penn State epidemiologist who has written extensively about athletes' drug use, he foresees a "very bleak future" for spectator sports if the professional leagues and Olympics allow gene doping to take hold.

 

"I think if that cat gets out of the bag, even the most optimistic person will have to admit it is all over," he says. "We are not going to be able to control it."

Article

[Vigo 0]

So with this gene thing are they saying anybody can be a world class athlete?

[Guest pinnacleofallthingsmanly]

This seems like it's straight out of a comic book. Or the Nutty Professor.

[Guest Brian]

I've been reading alot about gene doping lately, because they're really starting to isolate the function of certain genes and I think it's a huge threat to sports and human evolution in general.

[EVIL~! alkeiper 0]

Personally, I can't see gene doping working. Genes sure worked for John Henry Williams, didn't they?

[Art Sandusky 0]

Sports Illustrated actually had something about this eventually happening back in 1998, I think.