Survey of ochratoxin A in rice from Iran using affinity column cleanup and HPLC with fluorescence detection

Abstract

This paper records the occurrence and levels of ochratoxin A (OTA) in rice using a HPLC technique preceded by an immunoaffinity clean-up step. The method was based on the extraction of finely ground rice sample with an acetonitrile/water (60 : 40, v/v) solution. Recovery was 98.9% while the limit of detection (LOD) was 0.2 ng g⁻¹. A total of 182 rice samples were analyzed with a frequency of contamination of 6%. Levels of OTA in positive samples ranged 0.2–4.8 ng g^–1, with an average contamination of all analyzed samples of 1.6 ng g^–1.

Keywords:

• rice
• mycotoxins
• ochratoxin A

Acknowledgements

The authors thank the Testa Quality Control Laboratory (TQCL) for financial support.