PARIS - PERFORMANCE-ENHANCING drugs to help students burn the midnight oil, learn faster or have better recall at exam time could pose a major dilemma for colleges in the future, according to a paper published on Thursday.

Writing in the Journal of Medical Ethics, psychologist Vince Cakic of the University of Sydney, Australia, says that 'nootropics' - drugs designed to help people with cognitive problems - are already being used off-label to boost academic performances.

Amphetamines and methylphenidates, marketed as Dexedrine and Ritalin, are time-honoured stimulants used by as many as a quarter of students in some US colleges, especially those with competitive admission standards, according to figures from US research quoted by Mr Cakic.

These drugs are used medically to treat attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and uncontrolled sleepiness.

A newer-generation temptation of the same class of drug is modafinil, branded as Provigil.

For boosting memory retention, says Cakic, the potential drugs include donepezil (Aricept), used to treat Alzheimer's disease; galantamine (Reminyl); and piracetam, branded as Nootropil. For more get-up-and-go, there is selegiline, or Deprenyl.

So far, these drugs offer only a modest perk in performance, but more powerful versions are in the pharmaceutical pipeline and may well have a potent allure, said Cakic.

'The possibility of purchasing 'smartness in a bottle' is likely to have broad appeal to students with normal or above-average cognitive functioning,' he argues.

Mr Cakic says the experience of campaigns to stamp out doping in sport should serve as a warning.

Performance-enhancing drugs may not only be physically dangerous, addictive and have unwanted mental side-effects, they would also be near-impossible to control, he says. -- AFP