Abstract
A new method for the determination of the mycotoxin zearalenone (ZON) in food and feed, based on HPLC–MS with an atmospheric-pressure chemical ionization (APCI) interface after extraction from cereals and clean-up by either conventional solid-phase or immunoaffinity cartridges is presented. The APCI interface parameters are optimized to provide detection of ZON with maximum sensitivity after RP separation of ZON on a C 18 column with acetonitrile–water (40:60, v/v) at 1 ml/min column flow without split. Using APCI-MS detection, the sensitivity of the method was improved by a factor of ca. 50 in comparison to HPLC with fluorescence detection, allowing determination of ZON down to 0.12 μg/kg maize which is well below present threshold values. Due to the selectivity of MS detection, it also was possible to quantitatively determine ZON both in raw extracts without clean-up using a normal-size (100 mm) chromatographic column or using only a short (20 mm) chromatographic column, when a clean-up was done to minimize possible interferences.
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