Aggregated News
This could be a battle like no other in sport. The authorities are so concerned, they have been preparing for it for more than 10 years. But it is still unclear whether they have the tools to test for it – or whether anyone has done it successfully. It is gene doping.
The idea is simple: to alter our genetic makeup, the very building blocks of who we are, in order to make us stronger or faster. The practicalities are highly complex.
Gene therapists - for example those treating very sick children at London's Great Ormond Street hospital - add a synthetic gene to the patient's genome, and reintroduce it into the bone marrow via a disabled virus. The new gene is expressed by the patient's cells and acts like a medicine, permanently incorporated in the bone marrow.
It is still a highly specialised, rare treatment, but the principle is being used for research into an ever wide range of diseases, including those where the muscles deteriorate. At which point, it becomes easier to imagine how athletes might benefit.
Behind...