A Preliminary Study to Classify Corn Silage for High or Low Mycotoxin Contamination by Using near Infrared Spectroscopy

Abstract

Mycotoxins should be monitored in order to properly evaluate corn silage safety quality. In the present study, corn silage samples (n = 115) were collected in a survey, characterized for concentrations of mycotoxins, and scanned by a NIR spectrometer. Random Forest classification models for NIR calibration were developed by applying different cut-offs to classify samples for concentration (i.e., μg/kg dry matter) or count (i.e., n) of (i) total detectable mycotoxins; (ii) regulated and emerging Fusarium toxins; (iii) emerging Fusarium toxins; (iv) Fumonisins and their metabolites; and (v) Penicillium toxins. An over- and under-sampling re-balancing technique was applied and performed 100 times. The best predictive model for total sum and count (i.e., accuracy mean ± standard deviation) was obtained by applying cut-offs of 10,000 µg/kg DM (i.e., 96.0 ± 2.7%) or 34 (i.e., 97.1 ± 1.8%), respectively. Regulated and emerging Fusarium mycotoxins achieved accuracies slightly less than 90%. For the Penicillium mycotoxin contamination category, an accuracy of 95.1 ± 2.8% was obtained by using a cut-off limit of 350 µg/kg DM as a total sum or 98.6 ± 1.3% for a cut-off limit of five as mycotoxin count. In conclusion, this work was a preliminary study to discriminate corn silage for high or low mycotoxin contamination by using NIR spectroscopy.

Handheld Fluorescence Spectrometer Enabling Sensitive Aflatoxin Detection in Maize

“…Optical spectroscopy has been identified as a promising sensing technique for aflatoxin detection in food [ 14 , 15 , 16 ]. Particularly, different spectroscopic sensing techniques have already been investigated, including fluorescence spectroscopy, Raman spectroscopy and reflection spectroscopy, covering the visible, near-infrared (NIR) and short-wave infrared (SWIR) spectral bands.…”

The potential and applicability of infrared spectroscopic methods for the rapid screening and routine analysis of mycotoxins in food crops

“…In addition to NIRS and MIRS, mainly used for the analysis of bulk samples, single kernel NIRS (SKNIR) and HSI have also been used for mycotoxin determination focusing on the analysis of individual kernels (Tables 4 and 5, respectively). Besides classic agricultural commodities as listed in Tables 1–5 MIRS, NIRS and HSI have also been used to analyze raisins (Galvis‐Sánchez et al., 2007; Heperkan & Gökmen, 2016), chili powder (Tripathi & Mishra, 2009), almonds (Liang et al., 2015; Mishra et al., 2022), pistachios (Kheiralipour et al., 2016; Wu & Xu, 2019), garlic (Liang et al., 2015), figs (Durmuş et al., 2017), green coffee (Taradolsirithitikul et al., 2017), milk (Jaiswal et al., 2018), green tea (Cao et al., 2020), corn silage (Ghilardelli et al., 2022), and bio‐ethanol byproducts (Tyska et al., 2022) regarding their contamination with mycotoxins or mycotoxigenic fungi infestation.…”

Characterization of mycotoxins and microbial community in whole-plant corn ensiled in different silo types during aerobic exposure

“…Silage plays an important role in the global agricultural and agri-food industries, ensuring a constantly nutritious supply for ruminants, especially whole-plant corn silage (WPCS), which is used in ruminant feeding as an important source of a high energy content and digestible fiber ( Khan et al, 2015 ; Gheller et al, 2021 ). However, silage can be contaminated with biological and chemical hazards from inherent mycotoxins and accidental fungi when there is a lack of standardized manufacturing and processing, storage or transport ( Ghilardelli et al, 2022 ). This contamination is worse during the aerobic exposure period than during other stages.…”