8th International symposium​​ on Hormone and Veterinary Drug Residue Analysis, VDRA 2018, Ghent, Belgium

Emiliano attended the 8th International Symposium​ on Hormone and Veterinary Drug Residue Analysis, VDRA 2018, Ghent, Belgium in May 2018 with an oral presentation entitled “A rapid, simple and cost-effective UHPLC-MS/MS method to monitor for SARMs abuse in urine samples”.

Oral presentation abstract: selective androgen receptor modulators (SARMs) are gaining popularity as an emerging alternative to anabolic-androgenic steroids due to their strong anabolic activity combined with an absence of undesirable androgenic-side effects. As a direct response to the possible application of SARMs in illicit practices in both stock farming and racing animals, a semi-quantitative UHPLC-MS/MS method was developed to monitor for 15 SARMs belonging to different families in bovine, equine and canine urine, respectively. SARM residues were extracted from urine (200 µL) with TBME without clean-up, concentrated under nitrogen and analysed by UHPLC-MS/MS. The method was validated according to the Community Reference Laboratories Residues (CRLs) 20/1/2010 guidelines with CCβ values determined at 1 ng mL^-1, excluding andarine (2 ng mL^-1) and BMS-564929 (5 ng mL^-1), in three different species. The lack of knowledge on stability of SARM compounds was a driving force to perform studies to assess the stability of these analytes in urine matrices of interest under frozen storage (-20°C, -70°C) and freeze-thaw cycle conditions, as well as in working standard solutions. The developed assay is being employed for screening purposes in bovine, equine and canine urine samples to determine the extent of SARMs abuse in stock farming and competition animals, respectively.