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11.03.2019

What you should know about supplements with 5-alpha-hydroxy-laxogenin

Most bodybuilding supplements with 5-alpha-hydroxy-laxogenin contained a hodgepodge of synthesized compounds, which the producer should have cleared from the preparation. The other supplements contain completely different substances, such as anabolic steroids. This is the conclusion of American chemists who have analyzed 13 supplements.

Methylclostebol in a 'supplement'
When researchers at the University of Mississippi in 2014 received a new bodybuilding supplement in their laboratory, they were puzzled. According to the label, the product contained 5-alpha-hydroxy-laxogenin, which is - according to the supplements industry - a metabolite of laxogenin. Laxogenin is a steroidlike substance that occurs naturally in Smilax sieboldii and other plants.

And that's weird. In a lab, a chemist can convert laxogenin into 5-alpha-hydroxy-laxogenin, but 5-alpha-hydroxy-laxogenin does not occur in nature. At least it has never been found in plants.

When the researchers analyzed the supplement, they found multiple substances that were not mentioned on the label. Some of them were on the doping list, and one of them was the anabolic steroid methylclostebol. A recommended daily dose of the supplement in question contained as much as 30 milligrams of the stuff.

Study
Alarmed by their findings, the researchers bought 12 bodybuilding supplements with 5-alpha-hydroxy-laxogenin, and analyzed them thoroughly. In 7 of those supplements they actually found 5-alpha-hydroxy-laxogenin, in the remaining 5 there was no trace of the substance.

In all products, the researchers found substances that were not on the label. Three products contain anabolic steroids, such as DHEA, testosterone propionate, the antioestrogenic androsta-3,5-diene-7,17-dione and a steroid that the researchers could not identify. The researchers found methoxivone in 3 products.

In ten products, the researchers found analogues of 5-alpha-hydroxy-laxogenin. These analogues have in common that they arise when you use diosgenin, a relatively cheap plant substance, to synthesize laxogenin or 5-alpha-hydroxy-laxogenin.

Conclusion
The researchers suspect that the producer of the 'extracts' with 5-alpha-hydroxy-laxogenin does not sell any extract at all. Instead, the producer bought diosgenin, tried to make 5-alpha-hydroxy-laxogenin, and put the half-baked end result on the market without a proper purification procedure.

"These ingredients should not be included in dietary supplements," the researchers write.

Source:
J Pharm Biomed Anal. 2019 Apr 15;167:74-82.

More:
Laxogenin reduces fat percentage, hydroxy-laxogenin increases muscle mass 26.08.2018
Laxogenin and 5-hydroxy-laxogenin: natural anabolics that can enhance real anabolic steroids 31.05.2016

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