Nearly a dozen products marketed as weight-loss agents, physical performance improvers, and cognitive function enhancers have been found to include potentially dangerous ingredients.

The amphetamine-like compound, known as BMPEA, is often advertised as an extract of the plant Acacia rigidula, a shrub native to Texas. However, the substance is actually an artificially created “designer stimulant,” and not often listed on labels, according to the Associated Press.

The study was published on Tuesday in the journal Drug Testing and Analysis. According to the authors, the Food and Drug Administration located the presence of BMPEA in dietary supplements as far back as 2013, but took no steps to either order its removal or warn consumers of its presence. The compound’s health risk for humans is unknown, although it has been found to raise blood pressure in cats and dogs.

“These are things that are signals that in humans will later turn into heart attacks, strokes and maybe even sudden death,” said dietary supplement expert Dr. Pieter Cohen, who is also an assistant professor at Harvard Medical School. “There is not a single weight loss supplement on the market that is legal and that has been shown to lead to weight loss in humans,” he explained Tuesday on CBS This Morning.

Under the 1994 Dietary Supplement and Health Education Act, certain products are not subject to FDA testing before being sold on the market. The FDA is only empowered to act after problems are discovered, which makes it difficult to effectively regulate the safety of dietary supplements.

Some companies are playing it safe and suspending the sales of all products containing BMPEA. “While the FDA has not declared the fat-burning ingredient BMPEA to be harmful,” said Kathleen Reed, an executive with the company Vitacost, “we take safety concerns very seriously for all of the 45,000-plus products sold on Vitacost.com.”

The FDA is conducting further investigation into the potentially dangerous substance. “While our review of the available information on products containing BMPEA does not identify a specific safety concern at this time, the FDA will consider taking regulatory action, as appropriate, to protect consumers,” said spokeswoman Juli Putnam.