%0 Journal Article
%T Mycotoxin Analysis: New Proposals for Sample Treatment
%A Natalia Arroyo-Manzanares
%A Jos¨¦ F. Huertas-P¨¦rez
%A Ana M. Garc¨ªa-Campa£¿a
%A Laura G¨¢miz-Gracia
%J Advances in Chemistry
%D 2014
%R 10.1155/2014/547506
%X Mycotoxins are toxic secondary metabolites produced by different fungi, with different chemical structures. Mycotoxins contaminate food, feed, or raw materials used in their production and cause diseases and disorders in humans and livestock. Because of their great variety of toxic effects and their extreme heat resistance, the presence of mycotoxins in food and feed is considered a high risk to human and animal health. In order to ensure food quality and health consumers, European legislation has set maximum contents of some mycotoxins in different matrices. However, there are still some food commodities susceptible to fungal contamination, which were not contemplated in this legislation. In this context, we have developed new analytical techniques for the multiclass determination of mycotoxins in a great variety of food commodities (some of them scarcely studied), such as cereals, pseudocereals, cereal syrups, nuts, edible seeds, and botanicals. Considering the latest technical developments, ultrahigh performance liquid chromatography coupled to tandem mass spectrometry has been chosen as an efficient, fast, and selective powerful analytical technique. In addition, alternative sample treatments based on emerging methodologies, such as dispersive liquid-liquid microextraction and QuEChERS, have been developed, which allow an increased efficiency and sample throughput, as well as reducing contaminant waste. 1. Introduction Mycotoxins are toxic natural secondary metabolites produced by several species of fungi (as Fusarium, Aspergillus, and Penicillium genera) on agricultural commodities. The presence of mycotoxins in food and feed may affect human and animal health, as they may cause many different adverse effects such as estrogenic, gastrointestinal, and kidney disorders, induction of cancer, and mutagenicity. Furthermore, some mycotoxins are also immunosuppressive and reduce resistance to infectious diseases [1, 2]. Mycotoxins grow under a wide range of climatic conditions and the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) has estimated that they affect 25% of the world crops. On the other hand, mycotoxins are the hazard category with the highest number of border rejections reported by the Rapid Alert System for Food and Feed (RASFF) [3]; therefore their impact on economy is evident. Hundreds of mycotoxins have been recognized with diverse chemical structures, different toxicity, and biological effects. The most relevant groups of mycotoxins found in food are aflatoxins (aflatoxin B1 (AFB1, included in group 1 of carcinogenic to humans by the
%U http://www.hindawi.com/journals/ac/2014/547506/