ANDRO: WHAT'S KNOWN

According to the Endocrine Society: 1. Androgens are the male sex steroids. They increase body hair, facial hair and acne; deepen the voice; enhance prostate growth; and promote muscle growth. The best known androgen is testosterone. 2. Andro is a steroid. In the body, it is converted to testosterone. It can also be converted into the female sex steroid, estrogen, in boys and girls. 3. Andro is not a banned androgenic steroid in baseball, but it is banned in most other sports, both in the U.S. and abroad. 4. Andro can not be a dietary supplement, since it is not part of a normal diet. 5. The body has its own wisdom. Too much androgen shuts off the body's own production of testosterone. This can impair normal testicular function -- "it shrinks your grapes to raisins." 6. The use of androgens is especially dangerous among adolescents in whom it is known to stunt growth.

Amid the emotion, some answers are emerging about the substance. On Sept. 29, The Endocrine Society, the world's oldest and largest organization devoted to research on hormones, announced its position that not enough is known about Andro to declare it safe or effective. The 9,000-member group of doctors and scientists believes that more research is needed before its use can be recommended.

What is known, according to the Endocrine Society, is display in the charts at left and below.

Outside the Lines also spoke to Dr. Gary Wadler, a New York sports physician and a consultant to the U.S. Department of Justice on anabolic-androgenic steroid abuse. Below are excerpts of the conversation with Wadler, who can answer any other questions you may have about andro in an ESPN.com chat session on Wednesday at 4:30 p.m. ET:

Question: How long has androstenedione been around?

Dr. Gary Wadler: Androstenedione's been around a long time. There's nothing new about Androstenedione. Androstenedione normally occurs in the body. It's the building block that becomes testosterone. It's one step away from testosterone.

The commercial interest in Androstenedione was much less (before the enactment of a 1990 federal law designed to prevent the distribution of illegal, anabolic steroids) because the marketplace was flooded with the real thing, anabolic steroids. So it's been around. I just don't think there was a demand for it and I don't think the market has seized the opportunity to promote it because it just wasn't appreciated.

Q: In your expert opinion, should Androstenedione be known as a supplement or a drug, a steroid?

Wadler: Androstenedione is a steroid, always was a steroid, always will be a steroid and should be treated with utmost respect and as a drug and not as a dietary supplement.

Q: Athletes who take it feel that it's perfectly safe because it's called a natural supplement, and it can be bought over the counter. Do you think it should be taken off of the counters?

Wadler: Androstenedione is no safer than testosterone. Androstenedione becomes testosterone. In many ways, they're one and the same. It's just a matter of quantity. I do not believe it should be available over the counter, period.

Q: What does it do to aid an athlete?

Wadler: Androstenedione becoming testosterone does the very same things that all anabolic steroids do ... It doesn't work automatically, you just don't take the Androstenedione or testosterone or any anabolic steroid and get stronger. You have to work out. You have to use resistive exercises. You have to be on a high protein diet.

Q: What athletes and what sports would Androstenedione be most beneficial to?

ANDRO: WHAT'S UNKNOWN

According to The Endocrine Society: 1. Whether Andro improves athletic performance. 2. How much Andro is converted to male or female sex steroids when it is taken by mouth or injected. 3. How much Andro is absorbed in the body, or where in the body it goes. 4. Whether Andro shrinks testicular size like androgens do. 5. Whether Andro causes liver cancers and heart disease like oral androgens do. 6. How to detect Andro by drug testing. 7. The purity of commercial andro is unknown, unregulated, and probably varies a lot. The user of Andro has no way of knowing what he or she is taking.

Wadler: Androstenedione and testosterone typically are used, as are all anabolic steroids, in strength sports. It's not really a drug that one would use for an endurance sport. And everybody has appreciated the strength elements. I must admit that there were members in my profession who were skeptical as to whether it worked, (but) it's unequivocal that it does increase strength in a variety of settings.

Q: So it would be beneficial for a football player?

Wadler: Oh, absolutely.

Q: Basketball player?

Wadler: Absolutely.

Q: Hockey player?

Wadler: I think in any sport where strength is an element, there is a potential advantage.

Q: Is there an empirical test which measures the level of Andro in the body?

Wadler: You can measure the level of Andro in the body. You can measure the level of Androstenedione in the urine, the blood. There's a normal range that everybody has. Androstenedione is normally manufactured in the body by the adrenal glands and the gonads and becomes testosterone and it's like any other chemistry in the body -- there's a certain normal range, and it's measurable.

Q: In terms of performance, how does Andro affect teenage athletes?

Wadler: Well, if you're an adolescent who has not gone through the surge in testosterone that happens during adolescence, then anything that raises your testosterone level will have a greater impact. So younger people who are exposed to testosterone suddenly will have all this muscular development ... The price is the side effects and the most serious (side effect) is permanently stunting their growth by prematurely closing the growth plates in their long bones.

The effect of steroid hormones like testosterone may not be evident immediately while you're taking it. It may become evident 5 years later, 10 years later (in the form of) development of premature heart disease, abnormalities in cholesterol metabolism, developing abnormalities in the liver -- blood filled cysts in the liver, benign tumors of the liver. It may change their sexual maturation patterns. It may change their behavior patterns. It may make them more assertive, it may make them outwardly aggressive. There's a whole litany.