The study of some new anabolic drugs by metabolism experiments with Neomysis integer Original Research Article

New illegal veterinary drugs are produced and distributed on the black market continuously. The anabolic drugs described here were found on the black market for body-builders, but are probably also available for growth promoting purposes in cattle. The residue laboratories are obligated to develop extraction and detection methods to identify and/or quantify the metabolites of these continuously emerging new drugs. In practice, the formation of the metabolites is investigated with animal experiments in which vertebrate animals are treated with the illegal compound. Different matrices of the animal are collected and examined. Because of the complexity and duration of the animal experiment and the method development, a lot of time and money is consumed. Some of these vertebrate experiments can be replaced by invertebrate metabolism experiments [K. De Wasch, S. Poelmans, T. Verslycke, C. Janssen, N. Van Hoof, H. De Brabander, Anal. Chem. Acta 473 (2002) 59; T. Verslycke, K. De Wasch, H. De Brabander, C. Janssen, Gen. Comp. Endocr. 126 (2002) 190; S. Poelmans, K. De Wasch, Y. Martelé, R. Schilt, N. Van Hoof, H. Noppe, T. Verslycke, C.R. Janssen, D. Courtheyn, H.F. De Brabander, Proceedings of the Euro Food Chem XII Strategies for Safe Food, September 24–26, Brugge, Belgium, 2003, p. 74]. By using an invertebrate for the metabolism studies there is a reduction in time and money in comparison with vertebrate animal experiments. In this study an invertebrate model, the mysid crustacean Neomysis integer (Crustacea, Mysidacea) was used as an alternative model for metabolism of some new anabolic drugs. The investigated analytes were dehydroepiandrosterone (DHEA, (3β)-3-hydroxy-androst-5en-17one), maxterone (ADL: 5α-androstan-3β,17β-diol), 5-androstenedione (5AED, 5-androstene-3,17-dione), 5α-androstenedione (5αAED, 1-androstene-3,17-dione) and 1-testosterone (A1T, 1-(5α)T, 1-(5α)-androsten-17β-ol-3-one).