Tuesday, April 29, 2008
Some Athletes' Genes Help Outwit Doping Test :
The 55 men in a drug doping study in Sweden were normal and healthy. And all agreed, for the sake of science, to be injected with testosterone and then undergo the standard urine test to screen for doping with the hormone. The whole "Asian" angle wouldn't be as important from where I stand if China wasn't intent on becoming an athletic superpower. Specifically, from Doping Test Results Dependent on Genotype of UGT2B17, the Major Enzyme for Testosterone Glucuronidation: We demonstrated that a deletion polymorphism in the gene coding for UGT2B17...is strongly associated with TG levels in urine...All subjects devoid of the gene had a T/E ratio below 0.4...This polymorphism was considerably more common in a Korean Asian than in a Swedish Caucasian population, with 66.7 and 9.3 % deletion/deletion (del/del) homozygotes respectively. They don't seem to know what SNP is causing this. If you are curious, you can check out the linkage disequilibrium around UGT2B17. Labels: Genetics |