Ochratoxin A is a toxic and carcinogenic fungal secondary metabolite; its presence in foods is increasingly regulated. Various fungi are known to produce ochratoxins, but it is not known which species produce ochratoxins consistently and which species cause ochratoxin contamination of various crops. We isolated fungi in the Aspergillus ochraceus group (section Circumdati) and Aspergillus alliac...

The approach to assess exposure to ochratoxin A from the diet by the analysis of human plasma and urine samples has been developed. Composite duplicate diet samples from 50 individuals and corresponding plasma and urine samples were obtained over 30 days. Samples were analysed using sensitive methods capable of measuring ochratoxin A at 0.001 ng g(-1) in food, 0.1 ng ml(-1) in plasma and 0.01 n...

Ochratoxin A, a naturally occurring mycotoxin, has recently been shown to cause renal and hepatic carcinomas in mice. In the present studies, the effects of ochratoxin A on immune mechanisms associated with tumor resistance were examined in mice using dose levels similar to those that cause neoplasia. Ochratoxin A was shown to specifically inhibit natural killer (NK) cell activity and increase ...

A monoclonal antibody specific to ochratoxin B (OTB) was employed for the development of an indirect competitive OTB-ELISA. The optimized OTB-ELISA resulted in a limit of detection (LOD) for OTB of 3 µg/L (8 nM), a limit of quantification (LOQ) of 3.7 µg/L (10 nM), and a 50% inhibitory concentration (IC(50)) of 150 nM. Due to very low cross-reactivity to OTA (2.7%) and structurally related mole...

We review here the most frequently reported targets among the electrochemical immunosensors and aptasensors: antibiotics, bisphenol A, cocaine, ochratoxin A and estradiol. In each case, the immobilization procedures are described as well as the transduction schemes and the limits of detection. It is shown that limits of detections are generally two to three orders of magnitude lower for immunos...

o-Methoxycinnamaldehyde has been isolated and purified from powdered cinnamon. The compound inhibits the growth and toxin production of mycotoxin-producing fungi. The substance completely inhibited the growth of Aspergillus parasiticus and A. flavus at 100 microgram/ml and A. ochraceus and A. versicolor at 200 microgram/ml. It inhibited the production of aflatoxin B1 by over 90% at 6.25 microgr...

Aspergillus ochraceus NRRL 3174 produced 29 mg of ochratoxin A per 100 ml of nutrient medium consisting of 4% sucrose and 2% yeast extract. Ochratoxin A was the sole metabolite present in the chloroform extracts of the growth medium. Trace amounts of ochratoxin B were produced in a 1% yeast medium, and a comparatively large amount of ochratoxin B was produced in media containing 16 and 32% sucr...

A tuning method of continuous-time filters is proposed which is based on Genetic Algorithms. Simulation results show that the method can be used to tune OTA-Cfilters for a given accuracy within a reasonable time.

Aspergillus carbonarius is an ochratoxin A (OTA) producing fungus, predominantly responsible for the production of this mycotoxin in grapes, wine and dried vine fruits. The objective of this study was to determine the in vitro effects of water activity (a(w), 0.80-0.95) and temperature (15-35 degrees C) on lag phase extension and radial growth rate of a cocktail inoculum of four strains of A. c...