Mass Spectrometry for Mycotoxin Detection in Food and Food Byproducts

Abstract

Several advanced analytical techniques have been well established for mycotoxins analysis in food products. Contamination of food with mycotoxins takes special consideration due to its hazardous health effects. The detection of mycotoxins in foodstuffs is essential to ensure food quality. Liquid chromatography and tandem mass spectrometry have been well explored to detect various kinds of mycotoxins. This method has become the standard tool because of its flexible sample preparation protocol and analysis. However, most of the mycotoxins or modified mycotoxins are not commercially available as reference standards. As a result, high-resolution mass spectrometry (HRMS) approaches gradually increase to assure food quality. More importantly, Orbitrap and time-of-flight mass analyzers have been observed as the most effective techniques for multi-mycotoxin determination. HRMS has many advantages over conventional methods such as recording full scan spectra, screening both targeted and untargeted compounds, a high probability of structural confirmation, and high throughput of analysis data. Presently, liquid chromatography coupled with an HRMS has become efficient in mycotoxins detection in biological matrices. Fumonisins, aflatoxins, zearalenone, and trichothecenes are a few of the major mycotoxins produced by Fusarium species and occur naturally in sugarcane and cereal-based foods. Such contaminants can be evaluated by gas chromatography-mass spectroscopy, high-performance liquid chromatography, and liquid chromatography-electrospray ionization tandem mass spectrometry methods.