Abstract
While mycotoxins are generally regarded as food contamination issues, there is growing interest in mycotoxins as environmental pollutants. The main sources of trichothecene and zearalenone mycotoxins in the environment are mainly attributed to Fusarium infested fields, where mycotoxins can wash off in infested plants or harvest residues. Subsequently, mycotoxins inevitably enter the soil. In this context, investigations into the effects, fate, and transport are still needed. However, there is a lack of analytical methods used to determine Fusarium toxins in soil matrices. We aimed to validate an analytical method capable of determining the toxins nivalenol (NIV), deoxynivalenol (DON), 15-acetyl-deoxynivalenol (15-AcDON), and zearalenone (ZEN), at environmentally relevant concentrations, in five contrasting agricultural soils. Soils were spiked at three levels (3, 9 and 15 ng g−1), extracted by solid-liquid extraction assisted with ultrasonication, using a generic solvent composition of acetonitrile:water 84:16 (v:v) and measured by LC–HRMS. Method validation was successful for NIV, DON, and 15-AcDON with mean recoveries > 93% and RSDr < 10%. ZEN failed the validation criteria. The validated method was applied to eight conventionally managed maize field soils during harvest season, to provide a first insight into DON, NIV, and 15-AcDON levels. Mycotoxins were present in two out of eight sampled maize fields. Soil mycotoxin concentrations ranged from 0.53 to 19.4 ng g−1 and 0.8 to 2.2 ng g−1 for DON and NIV, respectively. Additionally, we found indication that “hot-spot” concentrations were restricted to small scales (<5 cm) with implications for field scale soil monitoring strategies.
Highlights
Fusarium is a genus of filamentous fungi, of which some species are known to be pathogenic to various plants, including cereal crops
We report all data that were above the instrumental LOQ, i.e., 0.5 ng g−1 soil, and mention the number of samples that were above the mean method LOQ (DON: 0.8 ng g−1 soil; NIV: 0.7 ng g−1 soil; Figure 3)
Our results show the presence of mycotoxins in 2 out of 8 field soils
Summary
Fusarium is a genus of filamentous fungi, of which some species are known to be pathogenic to various plants, including cereal crops These pathogenic species cause several serious plant diseases, such as stalk rot, which is globally the main reason for crop loss in maize production [1]. They are able to produce toxic secondary metabolites of the mycotoxin families, Type B trichothecene and zearalenone [2]. Concentrations of mycotoxins in food and feed are regulated in many countries for the safe commercialization of food and feed commodities [10,11], which is why there are many analytical methods for various food matrices [12,13]
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