ESTIMATION OF AFLATOXINS CONTAMINATION LEVELS IN INFANT PROCESSED FOODS BY RP-HPLC
Processed infant food samples (ready to eat) were analyzed for aflatoxins contamination using Reverse Phase High Performance Liquid Chromatography (RP-HPLC) with fluorescent detection. A solvent mixture of acetonitrile-water was used for the extraction followed by immunoaffinity clean-up to enhance sensitivity of the method. The limit of detection (LOD) (0.01–0.02 ng/g) and limit of quantification (LOQ) (0.02 ng/g) was established for aflatoxins based on signal to noise ratio of 3:1 and 10:1, respectively. The processed food samples tested, 38% were contaminated with four types of aflatoxins, i.e., AFB1 (0.02–1.24 μg/kg), AFB2 (0.02–0.37 μg/kg), AFG1 (0.25–2.7 μg/kg) and AFG2 (0.21–1.3 μg/kg). In addition, the results showed that 21% of the processed foods intended for infants contained AFB1 levels higher than the European Union permissible limits (0.1 μg/kg), while all of those intended for adult consumption had aflatoxin contamination levels within the permitted limits.