Rapid and sensitive determination of zearalenone in cereals by high-performance liquid chromatography with fluorescence detection

Abstract Zearalenone, an estrogenic mycotoxin of Fusarium species, in cereals can be extracted with acetonitrile—water (3:1), purified on a Florisil column, resolved by high-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) with a Nucleosil 50- 10 column using 90% water-saturated chloroform—cyclohexand—acetonitrile—ethanol (50:15:2:1) and quantitated by fluorescence measurement. This method is rapid, simple and reproducible, and detects zearalenone in wheat, barley, corn and other cereals with picogram sensitivity. A combination of this HPLC method with a gas—liquid chromatographic method for trichothecenes may be applied to the simultaneous detection of Fusarium mycotoxins (zearalenoone, nivalenol and deoxynivalenol) in cereals.