Quantitative Analysis for Measuring Lower Levels of Fusarium Mycotoxins in Wheat and Barley Using High-Resolution Mass Spectrometry

Abstract

This project involved the application of Quadrupole Time of Flight (QTOF) technology in quantitating the low concentrations of multiple Fusarium mycotoxins in barley and wheat, also focused on simplified sample extraction protocols such as ‘dilute and shoot.’ Ground samples of wheat and barley were extracted with acetonitrile-water-acetic acid solution (70:29:1 v/v/v). The quantitation was performed using a post spiking matrix-matched calibration curve approach. The method was linear over the range of 1.56 – 100 μg/kg for the toxins deoxynivalenol (DON), deoxynivalenol-3-glucoside (D3G), 3-acetyl deoxynivalenol (3-ADON), 15-acetyl deoxynivalenol (15-ADON), diacetoxyscirpenol (DAS), fusarenon-X (FUS-X), nivalenol (NIV), Neosolaniol (NEO), T2, and HT2 toxin. Zearalenone (ZEA). The recovery of the 11 mycotoxins in wheat and barley matrices at two levels were within 60 - 130.1%, and the relative standard deviation (RSD) of the replicate sample assay fell within 5 to 40%. Overall, this method was successfully validated for all the Fusarium toxins.