Quantitation of Aflatoxins in Food Materials Using HPLC-FLD Method

In this study, a sensitive high performance liquid chromatography coupled to a fluorescence detector (HPLC-FLD) method after post-column derivatisation was applied for the presence of aflatoxins (AFs) in 45 samples (dried apricots, raisins, dried figs, nuts, peanuts, almonds, corn, redpepper, blackpepper, bread and moldy cheese). Samples were collected four seasons from several open market places in Karaman/Turkey and checked for AFs levels. At the same time bread samples were incubated for seven day outdoors. The purpose of this experiment is to determine the time required to reach the critical aflatoxin amounts in the bread that we consumed in our home. AFs were present in 75% of dried apricots (6/8), 100% of raisins (8/8), 100% of dried figs (8/8), 75% of nuts (6/8), 50% of peanuts (4/8), 50% of almonds (4/8), 100% of corn (8/8), 100% of blackpepper (8/8), 100% of redpepper (8/8), 78.5% of bread (11/14), 75% of moldy cheese (3/4) at total AF levels ranging. Eight redpepper samples were above the European maximum tolerable limit (MTL) of 8 μg kg -1 for AFB1, while total AFs concentration exceeded the MTL of 10 μg kg -1 in eight redpepper samples. The amount of aflatoxin in other samples is lower than the value of European MLT.