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Survey of Alternaria toxin contamination in food from the German market, using a rapid HPLC-MS/MS approach

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Abstract

A HPLC-MS/MS-based method for the quantification of nine mycotoxins produced by fungi of the genus Alternaria in various food matrices was developed. The method relies on a single-step extraction, followed by dilution of the raw extract and direct analysis. In combination with an analysis time per sample of 12 min, the sample preparation is cost-effective and easy to handle. The method covers alternariol (AOH), alternariol monomethyl ether (AME), tenuazonic acid (TeA), altenuene (ALT), iso-altenuene (isoALT), tentoxin (TEN), altertoxin-I (ATX-I), and the AAL toxins TA1 and TA2. Some Alternaria toxins which are either not commercially available or very expensive, namely AOH, AME, ALT, isoALT, and ATX-I, were isolated as reference compounds from fungal cultures. The method was extensively validated for tomato products, bakery products, sunflower seeds, fruit juices, and vegetable oils. AOH, AME, TeA, and TEN were found in quantifiable amounts and 92.1 % of all analyzed samples (n = 96) showed low level contamination with one or more Alternaria toxins. Based on the obtained results, the average daily exposure to Alternaria toxins in Germany was calculated.

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Acknowledgments

The authors thank Sciex (Darmstadt) for supply of a QTRAP® 5500 mass spectrometer. We thank Angela Klusmeier-König and Imke Westkamp for support during sample preparation.

Source of funding

We thank the NRW Graduate School of Chemistry for the financial support.

Conflicts of interest

None.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Institute of Food Chemistry, Westfälische Wilhelms-Universität Münster, Corrensstraße 45, 48149, Münster, Germany

    Sebastian Hickert, Marian Bergmann, Seyma Ersen, Benedikt Cramer & Hans-Ulrich Humpf

  2. NRW Graduate School of Chemistry, Wilhelm-Klemm-Str. 10, 48149, Münster, Germany

    Sebastian Hickert & Hans-Ulrich Humpf

Authors
  1. Sebastian Hickert
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  2. Marian Bergmann
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  3. Seyma Ersen
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  4. Benedikt Cramer
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  5. Hans-Ulrich Humpf
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Hans-Ulrich Humpf.

Electronic supplementary material

Detailed description of the isolation procedure for AOH, AME, ALT, isoALT and ATX-I from fungal cultures including spectroscopic data and NMR data of synthesized TeA can be found in the Supplementary Material. Table S1 gives the complete validation parameters for all matrices, Tables S2 and S3 give concentrations of all calibration levels and spiking levels for method performance assessment.

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Hickert, S., Bergmann, M., Ersen, S. et al. Survey of Alternaria toxin contamination in food from the German market, using a rapid HPLC-MS/MS approach. Mycotoxin Res 32, 7–18 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12550-015-0233-7

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12550-015-0233-7

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