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January 2018

Scientific Trials—In the Laboratories, Not the Courts

Author Affiliations
  • 1University of Michigan Law School, Ann Arbor, Michigan
  • 2Indiana University School of Medicine, Indianapolis, Indiana
  • 3Cambridge Health Alliance, Harvard Medical School, Somerville, Massachusetts
JAMA Intern Med. 2018;178(1):7-8. doi:10.1001/jamainternmed.2017.5730

In 2015, one of us published a peer-reviewed study, together with colleagues at the University of California, San Francisco, replicating prior research from the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) detecting a designer stimulant, β-methylphenylethylamine, in sports, weight loss, and “cognitive function” supplements sold in the United States.1,2 The confirmatory study prompted the FDA to take enforcement action against companies selling the stimulant as a dietary ingredient.3

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