Prevalence of mould in chicken meat-cuts, giblets and products with immunoaffinity detection of aflatoxin residues

Abstract

Mould contamination and aflatoxin residues are considered big problems in the food chain, therefore 140 random samples of frozen chicken breast, thigh, gizzard, heart, liver, chicken burger, and chicken luncheon (twenty of each) were examined for detection of mould contamination level there proteolytic and lipolytic activity and aflatoxin residues in examined products. Mould colonies were detected in 100% and 30% of samples with mean values of 3.42±0.71 and 1.29±0.30 log10CFU/g in the chicken burger and chicken luncheon, respectively. The identified species were Aspergillus 76/140 (54.3%), Penicillium 39/140 (27.9%), Alternaria 35/140 (25%), Cladosporium 30/140 (21.4%), Rhizopus13/140 (9.3%), Acremonium 10/140 (7.1%), Mucor 9/140 (6.4%), Fusarium 7/140 (5%) and Sporotricum 7/140 (5%). Aspergillus niger, Aspergillus flavus, Aspergillus fumigatus, Aspergillus parasiticus, Aspergillus ochraceus and Aspergillus terrus were identified with total percentages of 53(37.9%), 25(17.9%), 21(15%), 5(3.5%), 5(3.5%) and 8(5.7%), respectively. The proteolytic and lipolytic activity detected in all species ranged between high, moderate and weak degrees except A. parasiticus shows only lipolytic activity. The examined samples had variable incidence and concentrations of aflatoxin residues as (20%) 1.49±0.53, (15%) 1.89±0.89, (55%) 8.79±14, (25%) 1.64±0.38, (20%) 2.3±0.72, (65%) 9.21±1.12 and (35%) 4.12±0.68 µg/ kg in frozen chicken breast, thigh, gizzard, heart, liver, chicken burger and chicken luncheon, respectively. Thus, strict hygienic measures during the production of chicken products must be adopted to minimize the deviation in their nutritional quality due to the growth of proteolytic and lipolytic mould, in addition, to protecting human health from the hazards of aflatoxin residues.