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Blood doping for students

Enhance performance!
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Blood doping has become part of competitive athletics. Atheletes use drugs like erythropoetin to increase their blood mass. This in turn increases delivery of oxygen to muscles, and improves performance significantly.

I propose that this same principle should also be able to improve intelligence, or at least test performance. Anemic people act sleepy and tired, and it is because they have decreased oxygen delivery to the brain. The brain is even more dependent on oxygen than the muscles. Increased blood mass through erythropoetin use should therefore be able to increase thinking ability just as it increase muscle performance. This would be useful for students taking tests, combat pilots, or any other endeavor where sharp thinking is important.

This theory could be tested. Get a class of college or medical students. The class takes an IQ or some similar standardized test. Half the class then gets a month of erythropoetin and half gets placebo, then all retake a different version of the same test.

bungston, Mar 06 2004

Blood doping overview http://www.tc.cc.tx...storey/beckham.html
[bungston, Oct 04 2004, last modified Oct 06 2004]

Natrecor http://www.sciosinc.com/scios/natrecor
... or, get rid of the water and salt that is diluting your blood tissue. [dpsyplc, Oct 04 2004, last modified Oct 06 2004]

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       don't they sell over the counter health food store products that do this?
theircompetitor, Mar 06 2004
  

       Maybe mix some Modafinil/Provigil in there, too?
bristolz, Mar 06 2004
  

       Anemic people are sleepy and tired because of x; I am sleepy and tired, therefore I am also x.   

       Scary.
dpsyplc, Mar 06 2004
  

       Blood doping isn't a mind-altering drug. It merely allows a person to function as though the local O2 concentration were higher; ritalin and the like make a fundamental change to your neurochemistry.   

       Though some sort of vitamin/ supplement that's optimized for enhancing *thinking* would be neat -- something akin to the protein shakes bodybuilders use, but in convenient, energy-drink form :)   

       Hmm... *grins*
Chrontius, Nov 23 2004
  

       isn't blood doping where pro athletes store samples of their own blood, then re-inject it right before a game to boost their red blood cell count?
sninctown, Apr 30 2006
  

       Nh, blood doping is where they take a blood sample, take out all the smart blood cells, and re-inject the stupid blood cells.
DesertFox, Apr 30 2006
  
      
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