Researchers at the University of Pennsylvania have developed a virus that causes an increase in muscle mass and strength without exercising. When combined with exercise it roughly doubled the mass/strength/speed. Hmmm, think there will ever be a 4 hour ironman?
I wouldn’t be at all surprised to find out some athletes have tried bootleg forms of this. Johan Musseuw was caught using synthetic hemoglobin that I don’t think had even been cleared for clinical trials…
Find it odd that right beside the interview window is a Disco. Channel ad with Lance.
Researchers at the University of Pennsylvania have developed a virus that causes an increase in muscle mass and strength without exercising. When combined with exercise it roughly doubled the mass/strength/speed. Hmmm, think there will ever be a 4 hour ironman?
http://www.exn.ca/video/?video=exn20040217-athletes.asx
http://www.upenn.edu/researchatpenn/article.php?768&hlt
There is something wrong here. Without exercise such improvements would be worthless and doubling the mass would could double the strength but not the speed, and certainly not both at the same time.
There is still such a thing in this world as coincidence…
There is something wrong here. Without exercise such improvements would be worthless and doubling the mass would could double the strength but not the speed, and certainly not both at the same time.
Wake up. That entire area of research is all about multiple sclerosis and other muscle-wasting diseases. Athletes are not the only people in the world that need muscles. Some people would just like to be able to walk across the room.
A promising area of research is the supression of myostatin. A natural side-use of such a treatment would be for athletes. One more thing that WADA will have to test for.
There is something wrong here. Without exercise such improvements would be worthless and doubling the mass would could double the strength but not the speed, and certainly not both at the same time.
Wake up. That entire area of research is all about multiple sclerosis and other muscle-wasting diseases. Athletes are not the only people in the world that need muscles. Some people would just like to be able to walk across the room.
A promising area of research is the supression of myostatin. A natural side-use of such a treatment would be for athletes. One more thing that WADA will have to test for.
I was simply referring to the performance enhancement “benefits” alluded to in the original post: “When combined with exercise it roughly doubled the mass/strength/speed”. Doubling the mass could double the strength, but not the speed. Isn’t that what I said?
There are other medical conditions where this research could have a benefit, but I don’t think MS is one of them as that is a nerve disorder, not a muscle (wasting or otherwise) disorder.
He didn’t say it doubles the muscle mass, he said it approximately doubled the training effect.
Holy SHIT! A virus to communicate this? Okay, so why do we get colds constantly? Aren’t we supposed to be immune to a virus once we’ve gotten sick from it?
That’s right, viruses mutate.
And though he said it was controlled by another substance such that it didn’t do anything unless it was in a muscle, does it differentiate between skeletal muscle vs smooth muscle (stomach, heart)?
Yes, I think the implications here are huge. I also think that it’s a LONG way from finding its way into human use.
He didn’t say it doubles the muscle mass, he said it approximately doubled the training effect.
I didn’t see the word training effect in the original post. Did you? I reproduced the sentence I was responding to. What is the problem?
Qualifying which muscles benefit - (A) conventional use of the word muscles ie external muscles like biceps, quadruceps, lats, pecs delts calves etc or (B) internal muscles such as heart and lungs …would be useful.
Road racing and Triathlons and other endurance activities benefit most from building (B). Mass and power building from such endurance sports is limited. And having muscle mass and more power is beneficial only from a power to weight ratio aspect. That is why EPOs are so popular amongst cyclist because that is focused directly on endurance enhancing properties as opposed to building muscle mass and power.
Bodybuilding and power sports like doing the Kilo track sprints or the 100m in track and field would get a much bigger boost from muscle mass and power enhancement treatments that work.
And JT thanks for that link. Amazing. If that virus genetic thing has no side effects. Frankly I wouldn’t hesitate to try some too. Getting that treatment and doing some rellevant training and turning oneself into a quasi superman …wow!
Holy SHIT! A virus to communicate this? Okay, so why do we get colds constantly? Aren’t we supposed to be immune to a virus once we’ve gotten sick from it?
That’s right, viruses mutate.
And though he said it was controlled by another substance such that it didn’t do anything unless it was in a muscle, does it differentiate between skeletal muscle vs smooth muscle (stomach, heart)?
Yes, I think the implications here are huge. I also think that it’s a LONG way from finding its way into human use.
A little clarification about the whole virus thing…
First of all the article is about mice which overexpress a certain gene and never mentions viruses. I’m not sure where the whole virus thing even came form, maybe its in the video clip (didnt watch it) edit: I need to read more carefully, saw it the second time
Researchers use viruses all the time to deliver foreign genes into cells. It’s simply a delivery mechanism. These viruses are not able to replicate, so couldnt actually spread in the environment. And while they’re used all the time for in vitro gene delivery, the clinical trials that I know of haven’t really worked due to a huge immune reaction against the virus.
this is old news.
see http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?articleID=000E7ACE-5686-10CF-94EB83414B7F0000
If you listened to the actual guy in the interview, he said it doubled the training effect. The rats increased muscle mass 15% just on the virus. Then they did another experiment where they put the rats on a weight lifting regimen (don’t ask me how they do that, that’s just what the guy said) that would do approximately the same thing. What happened is that the increase doubled (30%).
So then the effect would only be seen in the muscle that the substance (virus, gene, whatever) is directly injected into?
If you listened to the actual guy in the interview, he said it doubled the training effect. The rats increased muscle mass 15% just on the virus. Then they did another experiment where they put the rats on a weight lifting regimen (don’t ask me how they do that, that’s just what the guy said) that would do approximately the same thing. What happened is that the increase doubled (30%).
I didn’t listen to the interview, I responded to what was written. Either way, doubling the training effect would not double the speed.
And we will all hide are head and no t discuss the doping issue. Platitudes about testing will do.
I saw a movie on TV about a guy who used a similar technique to be stronger. I think it changed his DNA.
His name was spiderman if I am not mistaken.
Yeah, presumably you’d be going for a local effect. Although I suppose if you could get it into the liver, the liver would produce the IGF and release it into the bloodstream, giving you a more generalized effect. Or you could just inject GH, which would cause the liver to do te same thing…