Large-scale preparation and multi-dimensional characterization of high-purity mycotoxin deoxynivalenol in rice culture inoculated with Fusarium graminearum

Abstract

Food safety monitoring and toxicological research of mycotoxins are still in need of large quantities of high-purity deoxynivalenol (DON). To attain this purpose, a rapid, economical and reproducible purification method was developed for large-scale production of DON from rice culture inoculated with a DON-producing Fusarium graminearum strain JYH. The inoculated rice culture was first extracted with acetonitrile–water (84/16, v/v). The extracts were evaporated to dryness on a rotary evaporator after ethyl acetate partitioning and then dissolved in water followed by the final purification procedure through preparative high performance liquid chromatography and montmorillonite treatment. A combined approach of ultraviolet spectrometry (UV), ultra high performance liquid chromatography (UHPLC), mass spectrometry (MS) and nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) spectroscopy was applied for the multi-dimensional characterization of the target compound. As a result, the recovery of DON from the crude extract to the final product was up to 70%. An amount of 150 mg DON with the desirable purity of 98.93% could be obtained from 100 g of rice culture, which possessed identical immunochemical characteristics compared to a certified commercial DON standard. This proposed strategy might act as a valuable reference to obtain rather expensive compounds in a straightforward way.