Abstract

Mycotoxin contamination of agricultural food commodities and beverages poses a risk to human and animal health due to their toxic effects. Over 100 mycotoxins have been identified, although only a few of them present a significant source of food-borne illnesses and are of major concern worldwide. They are: aflatoxins B1 (AFB1), B2 (AFB2), G1 (AFG1) and G2 (AFG2), ochratoxin A (OTA), fumonisin B1 (FB1) and B2 (FB2), deoxynivalenol (DON), zearalenone (ZEA), T-2 and HT-2 toxins. In the European Union, harmonized maximum levels for mycotoxins in foodstuffs have been specified in the Commission Regulation EC 1881/2006, and further amendments. Effective and efficient analytical methods are therefore required to identify and determine mycotoxins at legislated levels and to enforce regulatory limits. Within this context the application of LC-MS(MS) techniques is being largely explored since it enables the simultaneous monitoring of different mycotoxins in one run. Even though LC-MS(MS) methodologies for single or multiple mycotoxin determination are routinely used in control laboratories, to date none of official or standard methods approved by AOAC International or CEN (European Standardization Committee) is based on LC-MS. Proficiency Testing (PT) is an effective procedure to determine the performance of individual laboratories for specific measurements, providing a clear and a straightforward way of evaluating the accuracy (trueness and precision) of results obtained by different laboratories.An international PT was organized in 2014 to check, next to the laboratory performance, the state-of-art of currently used multi-mycotoxin methods and their implementation in the respective laboratory. The PT was free of charge and was organized by ISPA-CNR in the framework of the Italian project S.I.Mi.S.A. (PON02_00186_3417512) and promoted by the MoniQA Association (www.moniqa.org). Within the EU Network of Excellence MoniQA several efforts have been made for method comparison and deeper understanding of performances of the available LC-MS(MS) methodologies for multiple-mycotoxin analysis [1,2]. Participants were asked to determine DON, FB1, FB2, ZEA, T-2, HT-2, OTA and aflatoxins (AFB1, AFB2, AFG1, AFG2) in maize, and DON, ZEA, T-2, HT-2 and OTA in wheat. The contaminated test materials were produced and characterized by ISPA-CNR. The use of LC-MS(MS) methods, although not strictly required, was highly recommended, while the use of multi-mycotoxin methods was mandatory. Participants were not obliged to determine all toxins in each material, and let free to report only on those mycotoxins that were simultaneously determined with their multi-mycotoxin methodology. Twenty-two participants from 10 countries registered for the exercise. Nineteen laboratories returned 22 sets of results for various combinations of analytes. Three laboratories returned two sets of results obtained by using two different methods for both contaminated maize and wheat. The assign

Autore Pugliese

• De Girolamo Annalisa , Pascale Michelangelo , Lattanzio Veronica Maria Teresa

Tutti gli autori

• A. De Girolamo; B. Ciasca; J. Stroka; S. Bratinova; M. Pascale; A. Visconti; V.M.T. Lattanzio.

Titolo volume/Rivista

Non Disponibile

Anno di pubblicazione

2015

ISSN

Non Disponibile

ISBN

Non Disponibile

Numero di citazioni Wos

Nessuna citazione

Ultimo Aggiornamento Citazioni

Non Disponibile

Numero di citazioni Scopus

Non Disponibile

Ultimo Aggiornamento Citazioni

Non Disponibile

Settori ERC

Non Disponibile

Codici ASJC

Non Disponibile