Mycotoxin occurrence in corn meal and flour traded in S~ ao Paulo, Brazil A.B.F. Bittencourt a , C.A.F. Oliveira b, * , P. Dilkin c , B. Corr^ ea c a Departamento de Pr atica de Sa ude P ublica, Faculdade de Sa ude P ublica, Universidade de S~ ao Paulo, Av. Dr. Arnaldo, 715, CEP 01246-904 S~ ao Paulo, SP, Brazil b Departamento de Zootecnia, Faculdade de Zootecnia e Engenharia de Alimentos, Universidade de S~ ao Paulo, Av. Duque de Caxias––Norte, 225, CEP 13630-000 Pirassununga, SP, Brazil c Departamento de Microbiologia, Instituto de Ci^ encias Biom edicas, Universidade de S~ ao Paulo, Av. Prof. Lineu Prestes, 1374, CEP 05508-900 S~ ao Paulo, SP, Brazil Received 11 May 2003; received in revised form 10 December 2003; accepted 11 December 2003 Abstract In the present study, 60 samples of corn meal and flour traded in S~ ao Paulo were analysed for determination of aflatoxins and fumonisins B 1 (FB 1 ) and B 2 (FB 2 ). No aflatoxin was found in samples of both products. In corn meal, the concentrations of FB 1 and FB 2 ranged from 1.1 to 15.3 mg kg 1 (mean: 5.2 mg kg 1 ) and 0.2 to 3.9 mg kg 1 (mean: 1.0 mg kg 1 ), respectively. Corn flour presented lower levels of FB 1 (0.5–7.2 mg kg 1 ; mean: 2.1 mg kg 1 ) and FB 2 (0.1–1.8 mg kg 1 ; mean: 0.7 mg kg 1 ). Considering the average values of FB 1 found in corn meal samples, as well as food consumption estimates in Brazil, the worst case of FB 1 con- sumption would be 2.9 lg kg body weight 1 per day. Results indicate the need for the adoption of practices to control the occurrence of fumonisins by manufacturers of corn products, mainly in corn meal. Ó 2004 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. Keywords: Fumonisins; Aflatoxins; Corn products 1. Introduction Mycotoxins are secondary metabolites produced by fungi that develop naturally in food products. These toxins may lead to a great variety of toxic effects in vertebrates, including humans (Coulombe, 1991). Exposure to toxins occurs predominantly by the inges- tion of contaminated food, especially cereals and grains, such as corn, wheat, and peanut, among others (Chu, 1991). Toxigenic fungi may contaminate food products at different phases of production and processing, mainly in favourable humidity and temperature conditions. Many mycotoxins also have significant chemical stability, which enables their persistence in food products even after the removal of the fungi by means of the usual manufacturing and packaging processes. The most common toxigenic fungi found in maize include species from the genera Aspergillus and Fusa- rium, mainly Aspergillus flavus, Aspergillus parasiticus and Fusarium verticillioides (Rodriguez-Amaya, 2001). Aspergillus species produce aflatoxins B 1 ,B 2 ,G 1 and G 2 , which are considered to be involved in the aetiology of human liver cancer (Chu, 1991). In Brazil, the occur- rence of aflatoxins in corn meal has been occasionally reported, at levels from 2.5 to 7.5 lg kg 1 (Milanez, Atui, & Lazzari, 1998). Nowadays, 16 molecular structures are called fu- monisins (Ah-Seo & Won Lee, 1999), however the pre- dominant toxin produced by F. verticillioides strains is fumonisin B 1 (FB 1 ). FB 1 is hepatocarcinogenic in rats, and is also associated to oesophagic cancer in humans, in some South Africa regions (Thiel, Marasas, Syden- ham, Shephard, & Gelderblom, 1992). As for the occurrence of fumonisins in Brazilian corn, Hirooka, Yamaguchi, Aoyama, Sugiura, and Ueno (1996) ob- served 97.4% and 94.8% of positive samples for FB 1 and FB 2 , respectively. There is very little information on the occurrence of fumonisins in Brazilian corn products, except for a * Corresponding author. Tel.: +55-19-3565-4173; fax: +55-19-3565- 4114. E-mail address: carlosaf@usp.br (C.A.F. Oliveira). 0956-7135/$ - see front matter Ó 2004 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. doi:10.1016/j.foodcont.2003.12.005 Food Control 16 (2005) 117–120 www.elsevier.com/locate/foodcont