A review of analytical methods for determining mycotoxins in agricultural products

Due to their unavoidable presence in agricultural products and their potential risk for human and animal health, it is imperative that mycotoxins be detected and removed from the food chain. This review reports both established conventional and emerging methods based on recent advances in mycotoxin analyses. Although most official detection methods are chromatographic (coupled with an ultraviolet or fluorescence detector), alternative strategies such as immunochemical methods and liquid chromatography coupled with mass spectrometry have seen a major breakthrough on the commercial market. They comport the advantages of making simple extraction possible along with high sensitivity multidetection. Emerging technologies are of potential application in the analysis of mycotoxins and may demonstrate advantages over the more conventional and well established techniques used as official analytical methods.