Background: Aflatoxin is a metabolic product of Aspergillus flavus that causes several injuries to vital organs in the body. Methods: The liver and kidney tissue of healthy rats challenged with toxigenic A. flavus after treatment with Lactobacillus plantarum and Lactobacillus delbrueckii were examined. Results: The weight of the liver (3.61 g) and kidney (11.33 g) of infected rats with toxigenic mould were significantly reduced (P<0.05) when compared to the group treated with Lactobacillus spp.; BD+AP+LP, BD+AP+LD and BD+ AP+LPD. The rats fed basal diet and Lactobacillus spp. have a normal histological structure. Necrotic lesions, thickening of the glomerular basement membrane and collapse of the glomerulus were observed in the liver and kidney of rats induced with A. flavus. The rats infected with Lactobacillus spp. regained their strength and activity after treatment but showed mild necrosis in the liver and thickening of glomerular basement in the kidney. Conclusions: The use of Lactobacillus species suppressed the growth and eliminated the potential risk of toxigenic A. flavus in the infected rats. This showed that Lactobacillus spp. possess some therapeutic properties due to their ability to secret secondary metabolites. The bioactive compounds can be exploited and used in food products to inhibit the growth of food borne pathogens.

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Aim: The need for formulating and developing smart baby-led weaning (BLW) foods from millet, soybean and ripe banana flour blends as alternative complementary foods inspired this study, which had no documentation in literatures. Place and Duration of Study: Department of Food Technology, Auchi Polytechnic, Auchi, Nigeria from June 2022 to January 2023. Methodology: Smart BLW foods were formulated from millet, soybean and ripe banana flour blends and coded as WMF (100% whole millet flour), MSB1 (60% millet; 20% soybean; 20% ripe banana) and MSB2 (50% millet; 30% soybean; 20% ripe banana). The sensory, proximate and mineral compositions of the foods formulated were compared with those of commercial weaning food (CWF). Results: MSB1 and MSB2 competed favourably with CWF in terms of texture, general acceptability, colour, aroma and taste attributes with high negative deviation most noticeable in WMF (P < 0.05), and exhibited acceptable shelf-life and stability. The ash contents ranged from 1.16±0.02% (WMF) to 2.83±0.02% (MSB2). Increase in fat content in MSB1 to CWF was ≈534%, MSB2 to CWF was ≈492%, MSB1 to WMF was ≈385% and MSB2 to WMF was ≈353% while their protein abundances were in the ratios 1:3.6 for CWF:MSB1, 1:5.9 for CWF:MSB2, 1:2.4 for MWF:MSB1 and 1:3.9 for MWF:MSB2. Generally, MSB1 and MSB2 were appropriate sources of Na, K, Ca, Mg and Zn compared to CWF and WMF in providing adequate intake (AI) and recommended daily allowance (RDA) of these minerals in both infants and children in the age classes of 0-6 months, 7-12 months and 1-3 years. Conclusion: MSB1 and MSB2 exhibited better intrinsic properties than WMF when compared with CWF. MSB1, however had better general performances than MSB2 and therefore, was recommended as the best smart BLW food formulation from this research.

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This publication is made publicly available in the institutional repository of Wageningen University and Research, under the terms of article 25fa of the Dutch Copyright Act, also known as the Amendment Taverne. This has been done with explicit consent by the author.Article 25fa states that the author of a short scientific work funded either wholly or partially by Dutch public funds is entitled to make that work publicly available for no consideration following a reasonable period of time after the work was first published, provided that clear reference is made to the source of the first publication of the work.This publication is distributed under The Association of Universities in the Netherlands (VSNU) 'Article 25fa implementation' project. In this project research outputs of researchers employed by Dutch Universities that comply with the legal requirements of Article 25fa of the Dutch Copyright Act are distributed online and free of cost or other barriers in institutional repositories. Research outputs are distributed six months after their first online publication in the original published version and with proper attribution to the source of the original publication.

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