COLUMBIA, Mo. -- Athletes sometimes add the natural supplement creatine to their diets to promote muscle growth. Now, researchers say creatine can help hogs yield more pork chops.

University of Missouri-Columbia researchers has reported that their experiments included feeding hogs a diet of corn and soybean meal blended with creatine and dextrose -- a sugar -- for 30 days.

The creatine-and-sugar blend produced animals with a 10 percent greater rate of loin muscle growth than hogs that didn't receive the supplements, said Eric Berg, an assistant professor of animal science.

The loin muscle produces pork chops.

Berg noted that creatine occurs naturally in the muscles of both humans and swine. It is made up of three amino acids, like the building blocks of protein. Creatine, which isn't banned from human use in international Olympic competition, should not be confused with performance enhancers such as steroids, the professor said.

"With creatine, we are looking at an alternative to synthetic growth promotants now available to swine producers," Berg said in a statement.

The researchers said one advantage to using creatine to promote pig growth would be the ability to label the meat as naturally produced.

The experiments are to be continued on larger lots of hogs. The university said its study has been accepted for publication in the scholarly journal Meat Science.