You sit in a chair, facing the wall. There are electrodes attached to your fingers, a rubber band strapped around your chest and wiring leading to an imposing, archaic-looking device. You are told not to move, to keep your hands and feet still and to answer all questions truthfully. A mountain of a man resembling a drill instructor who woke up on the wrong side of the bed asks questions like, "Have you ever stolen anything from someone you love?"

            WNBF and INBF competitors know this scene all too well. This polygraph examination is conducted on every athlete prior to their participation in a natural bodybuilding event. The purpose is to ascertain if the athlete has cheated the banned substance policy.

            Imagine if you had a lie detector test for your supplements. Think of all of the money you spend on supplements. Are you getting what you pay for? Wouldn't it be great to have a device like this to prove if your supplements are effective? Does that sound a little far-fetched, maybe even Orwellian? Well, guess again.

            Believe it or not, there is a new application of Nobel Prize winning technology that can do just that. The device is called the Biophotonic Scanner. It uses Raman Spectroscopy to measure carotenoid antioxidant molecules in human tissue. The scanner was developed at the University of Utah (the same institution that developed the artificial heart). A supplement company, Pharmanex, acquired the globally exclusive rights to this technology.

            The way it works, in layman's terms, is as follows. The scanner shines a low-level blue laser into the tissue on the palm of the human hand. That laser causes the carotenoid molecules to vibrate. The vibrations cause the light to scatter and change color. The scanner and associated computer software interpret the change and assign a number to those measurements.

            Dr. Lester Packer Ph.D., the father of antioxidant research, stated the following. "A study conducted by Pharmanex®, involving a large population (1,375 subjects), found compelling evidence that carotenoids are a good indicator of antioxidant status or oxidative stress (Smidt and Shieh, 2003). The study showed that people with high oxidative stress generally have low skin carotenoid levels, independent of their dietary carotenoid consumption." Specifically, the study reported that:

1. Smokers had significantly lower body defense scores (skin carotenoids) than non-smokers (13,030 vs. 19,890, respectively, p<0.01), independent of the number of daily fruit and vegetable servings or the calculated carotenoid consumption (using the USDA carotenoids database). These data are consistent with previous studies that reported that smoking causes oxidative stress and lowers antioxidant status (Dietrich et al., 2002; Arlberg, 2002).
2. People with habitual high sunlight exposure have significantly lower body defense scores than people with little sunlight exposure (16,446 vs. 20,085, p<0.001), independent of their carotenoid intake or dietary habits. Sunlight exposure is a known cause of oxidative stress and low antioxidant status, and has been demonstrated to reduce carotenoid levels (Alaluf et al., 2002; Stahl et al., 2001).
3. When analyzed by a different method based on urinary malondialdehyde excretion, an indicator of oxidative lipid damage, people with high oxidative stress had significantly lower body defense scores than people with low oxidative stress (19,392 vs. 29,590, p<0.01). Again, this relationship was not confounded by dietary carotenoid intakes, which were similar in both groups.

"These observations provide evidence that skin carotenoids as measured by the BioPhotonic Scanner do indeed reflect the body's overall antioxidant defense status," explained Dr. Packer.

There is also in an upcoming peer-reviewed study being published in a major nutritional journal, where it has been proven that carotenoids are directly correlated to the entire antioxidant network.

The scan takes approximately three minutes. It is painless and the results are given immediately. There are no needles, no transfer of body fluids, no surgical procedures and it is inexpensive (most scans cost between $5 and $10).

            Compare that to a serum blood test. The blood test requires needles, costs significantly more, takes approximately 3 weeks to get the results and is less accurate than the scan. A blood test is affected by food and nutrients that were ingested within a few hours of the test. The scanner measures from a cellular level. That means it is a better judge of how many nutrients you have been absorbing over the last few months, not hours.

            So what does that mean to Joe Average bodybuilder? Well, it should mean everything. This is baseline nutrition. Antioxidants are responsible for neutralizing the harmful affects of free radicals. We are bombarded by free radical activity every single day. Sunlight, stress, pollution, cigarette smoke, chemicals and toxins in your water and food, exercise and countless other sources generate free radical activity in your body. And, "yes" you did read correctly; I said "exercise." Exercise increases oxygen usage and this creates more free radicals, which attack your cells. Once a cell is attacked it creates more free radicals. This is the aging process in very simplified terms. If antioxidants neutralize free radicals it is easy to see that we should acquire as many antioxidants as we can get.

            From a bodybuilding standpoint the reduction of the affects from free radical damage is paramount to the recovery process. As we all know, recovery is king! We provide a stimulus to our muscles by training. Our bodies are forced to adapt to that stimulus. Adaptation is growth. Your nutrition needs to be sufficient enough for you to fully recover from those monster workouts you are having. 

Most of us take a multi-vitamin/multi-mineral product on a daily basis yet we have never had a way to prove if it is effective. Now we can. By scanning you will be able to tell how effective that supplement is. Isn't that the basis of science, the ability to measure? Would you feel better about paying for a supplement if you could be guaranteed that it would work? I thought so.

Not only is this a great tool to evaluate and improve existing supplements, but it is also an incredible way to create new supplements. Pharmanex has scanned approximately 3.5 million people, thereby creating the largest antioxidant database in the world. They have used this data to create a functional juice called G3. They have also improved on their multi-vitamin/multi-mineral product called LifePak. From the information gained by the scanner Pharmanex was able to use nanotechnology to give LifePak enhanced absorbability. This resulted in the LifePak Nano product. Both G3 and LifePak Nano come with a money back guarantee that they will increase your Skin Carotenoid Score. Now that's what I'm talking about! A way to prove it AND a money back guarantee? Sign me up.

This technology is revolutionizing the supplement industry. No longer can supplement companies produce inferior products and promote them solely on hype. All the claims about "the highest quality ingredients" and "the most bio-available" can be exposed or substantiated. This type of science is exactly what was needed in this multi-billion dollar industry (you and I are the ones supplying those dollars). There is no organization that oversees the supplement industry. Supplements are neither food nor drugs therefore they don't fall under the realm of the FDA. What a breath of fresh air to finally have a degree of policing. 

Technology of this magnitude causes me to ponder how far we have come in natural bodybuilding. When you look at the physiques in today's game it is amazing to see that today's natural athletes are producing development that rivals many of the drug assisted athletes of a few years ago. Most of that is due to technological breakthroughs in training and nutrition. We should embrace these advances and use them to continue to improve.