Mycotoxins and Other Natural Toxins Testing

Significance of the Topic

Natural toxins such as mycotoxins, plant toxins, marine biotoxins and freshwater cyanotoxins pose serious health risks to humans and animals and cause economic losses through crop rejection and livestock illness.
The globalized food supply and climate change increase contamination risks, driving regulatory limits and the need for rapid, sensitive, and multiplexed testing methods.

Aims and Overview of the Study

This application notebook compiles analytical approaches for the detection of four major groups of natural toxins in food, feed, drinking water and environmental samples:

• Mycotoxins in cereals, nuts, spices, milk and complex commodities
• Pyrrolizidine alkaloids in botanicals and honey
• Lipophilic and hydrophilic marine biotoxins in shellfish
• Freshwater cyanotoxins in drinking and surface waters

Methodology and Sample Preparation

Most methods employ simple extraction protocols followed by specific clean-up steps:

• Liquid–liquid or water-based extraction for mycotoxins and plant toxins
• Immunoaffinity chromatography or SPE cartridges (Oasis PRiME HLB, MCX) for selective cleanup
• Single-step acid extraction and graphitized carbon SPE for marine biotoxins
• Direct injection of filtered water for cyanotoxins

Used Instrumentation

High sensitivity and specificity are achieved using chromatographic separation and mass spectrometry platforms:

• ACQUITY UPLC H-Class and I-Class PLUS Systems
• Xevo TQ-XS, TQ-S, TQ-S micro tandem quadrupole MS
• Xevo G2-XS QTof high-resolution MS for non-targeted screening
• Vertu PREP and Vertu TOUCH lateral flow readers and VICAM strip tests for on-site mycotoxin screening

Key Results and Discussion

Validated methods deliver:

• Limits of quantification down to sub-µg/kg or sub-µg/L levels, meeting or exceeding regulatory thresholds
• Recoveries generally between 80–120% with repeatability ≤15% RSD
• Short run times (e.g., 3.5–5 minutes for UPLC versus 10–12 minutes for HPLC)
• Multiplexed detection of up to 50 mycotoxins or dozens of marine and freshwater toxins in a single analysis
• Interlaboratory studies confirming method transferability and robustness

Benefits and Practical Applications

The described workflows enable:

• Rapid screening and confirmatory testing for compliance with EU, USDA-FGIS and WHO guidelines
• On-site quantitative mycotoxin monitoring to inform harvest and processing decisions
• Cost-effective multiplex toxin profiling without extensive sample cleanup
• Enhanced laboratory throughput through UPLC speed and reduced maintenance

Future Trends and Applications

Emerging directions include:

• High-resolution non-targeted analysis to discover unknown toxin variants
• 2D-UPLC trap-and-elute systems for even greater sensitivity in water testing
• Green extraction technologies minimizing organic solvents and waste
• AI-driven data processing for automated detection, quantitation and retrospective screening

Conclusion

Comprehensive analytical platforms combining simple sample preparation, targeted and untargeted LC-MS/MS or UPLC-HRMS, and rapid lateral flow tests provide efficient solutions for safeguarding food, feed and water supplies against natural toxins.
These methods support regulatory compliance, risk assessment and proactive quality control across the supply chain.

References

No formal literature list provided; methods sourced from Waters application notes and interlaboratory studies.