A Survey of Total Aflatoxins in Food Using High Performance Liquid Chromatography-Fluorescence Detector (HPLC-FLD) and Liquid Chromatography Tandem Mass Spectrometry(LC-MS/MS)

A survey for total aflatoxins (aflatoxins , , , and ) was conducted on 245 cereals and processed cereal products, and 148 nuts and processed nut products in Korea, for a total of 393 commercialized ed samples. The total aflatoxins were quantified by the immunoaffinity column clean-up method with high performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) - fluorescence detection (FLD), and were confirmed by liquid chromatography tandem mass spectrometry (LC-MS/MS). Total aflatoxins(AFs) were detected in 37 samples (9.4% incidence), including 2 millet samples, 1 mixed cereal (sunsik), 1 powdered malt sample, 2 processed cereal products, 6 peanut samples, 22 peanut butter samples, and 1 sample each of almonds, adlay tea, and a processed nut product. The contamination levels were for aflatoxin , and for total aflatoxins. Finally, LC-MS/MS analysis of the contaminated samples was conducted to confirm the detected aflatoxins, and all 37 samples showing aflatoxins by HPLC-FLD were confirmed by LC-MS/MS.