| Aflatoxins B1, B2, G1, and G2 (AFB1, AFB2, AFG1, AFG2) are toxic metabolites generated by Aspergillus flavus and Aspergillus parasiticus. These toxins have been reported to be associated with acute liver damage, liver cirrhosis, induction of tumors and teratogenic effects. The presence of Aaflatoxins in many agricultural products such as corn, nuts, grain, and spices has been a global concern by both regulatory departments and the public. Therefore it is important to develop a fast sample preparation method for aflatoxins analysis in foods in response to food emergency.;Traditional immunoassay and solid-phase extraction (SPE) techniques have been used for extraction of aflatoxins in foods; however, those methods usually involve tedious conditioning steps and evaporation of large amounts of organic solvents. Disposable pipette extraction (DPX) is a type of newly developed SPE method that is easy, quick, and reliable. DPX eliminates the use of large volumes of organic solvents and is environmentally friendly. The current research employed sample preparation using DPX extraction followed by high performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) analysis of Aflatoxins B1, B2, G1, and G2. Mean recoveries for all targeted aflatoxins were determined to be above 80% with relative standard deviation of 13.3%, which showed good accuracy and precision. A matrix match calibration study was done using a cornmeal sample containing the aflatoxins to evaluate the linearity, limit of detection (LOD), limit of quantification (LOQ) of the current method. Good linearity was obtained for all aflatoxins with R2 value greater than 0.993. LOD and LOQ were found to be below 6.3 ppb and 19.01 ppb, respectively. After method validation, this technique was applied to real samples of corn muffin mix. It was found that the SPE technique using DPX is rapid, simple, and accurate for monitoring aflatoxins in corn products. |
