Mycotoxin analysis and detection

Mycotoxins are low-molecular-weight molecules derived from the secondary metabolism of molds. These molecules are produced by certain species of mold colonizing plants (cereals, fruit, vegetables) or foodstuffs. Due to their chemical nature, mycotoxins are highly stable, particularly thermostable, and difficult to eliminate. Given the toxic effects they induce, notably chronic toxicity of the carcinogenic type, mycotoxins introduced into food chains leading to humans can expose the latter to a number of health problems. An entire population may be affected by the possible contamination of a whole range of foods by a particular mycotoxin. This is why, as soon as aflatoxins were discovered, the public authorities considered them to be a public health problem, and organized regular national monitoring and official controls on production sites. Regulations and recommendations have been issued at national and then European level, and guide values exist at world level to ensure the reliability of food trade from the point of view of health safety. As a result, numerous analytical techniques have been developed to detect and quantify mycotoxins, with a preference for chromatographic or immunochemical methods. Analysts are working hard to validate their methods and make analytical results more reliable, since important decisions to withdraw or ban the use of raw materials or foodstuffs can be based on these results. The transfer of mycotoxins in the food chain, the analytical approach, the most commonly used analytical methods and the criteria for ensuring the reliability of the results issued will also be described in this article.