L'analyse des perturbations globales du métabolisme d'origine endocrinienne et son application au dépistage du dopage : quel potentiel, quel avenir ?

The present limitations in detecting unambigously doping in sports are effective, even though analytical tools are now very powerful to search known prohibited substances. Indeed, some widely accepted principles on which regulatory procedures are based to declare some samples are definitely positive should be reconsidered in depth. In this fight, some indirect methods may be really helpful to add supplementary biochemical proofs of doping, but at present time they are not considered as such. A new analytical methods based on the large metabolic exploration of individuals, i.e. metabonomics, has recently emerged in the domain of high throughput methods. Its interest in detecting use of anabolics in animal breeding has already been shown and functional understanding of coordinated metabolic deviations has been obtained recently. As far as doping control of sportsmen is concerned at the light of their continued medical follow-up, we can wonder whether metabonomics may not reinforce abuse control in sport, particularly when doping protocols that are suspected to be used are still ignored from regulatory instances. Some preliminary results are given concerning elite cyclists who were submitted to compulsory medical tests carried out by the French Cycling Federation.