Toxic metal and trace element status in the breast milk of Turkish new-born mothers.

BACKGROUND AND AIM: This study aims to evaluate the toxic metal and trace element concentrations in breast milk obtained from new-born nursing mothers in rural Giresun province, located on the coast of the Black Sea. METHODS: Milk samples were randomly collected once from early lactation of 50 nursing mothers. Inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry was used to analyse the concentrations of iron (Fe), nickel (Ni), manganese (Mn), cobalt (Co), chromium (Cr), copper (Cu), zinc (Zn), arsenic (As), molybdenum (Mo), cadmium (Cd) and lead (Pb) in the breast milk. Shapiro-Wilk test was used to evaluate the distribution of data. The Pearson-J correlation was used for normally distributed elements, and Spearman correlation analysis was used for others. RESULTS: The mean amounts of elements were 3.36 µg kg-1 of Cr, 9.26 µg kg-1 of Mn, 797 µg kg-1 of Fe, 1.99 µg kg-1 of Ni, 5.92 µg kg-1 of Cu, 379 µg kg-1 of Zn and 2.23 µg kg-1 of Pb. Co, As, Mo and Cd concentrations were below the detection limit. A highly significant correlation was found between iron and Nickel in breast milk. CONCLUSION: Our findings were evaluated in comparison with the WHO data, and whether they were in accordance with the recommended Dietary Reference Intake (DRI) values for 0-6-months-old infants was calculated. Pb levels were similar to those of WHO, while As and Cd were below the measurable limit. Fe, Mn, and Cr concentrations were higher than WHO data, while Co, Ni, Cu and Zn were lower. This research is the first study conducted in this region.

Comparing determination methods of detection and quantification limits for aflatoxin analysis in hazelnut.

Hazelnut is a type of plant that grows in wet and humid climatic conditions. Adverse climatic conditions result in the formation of aflatoxin in hazelnuts during the harvesting, drying, and storing processes. Aflatoxin is considered an important food contaminant, which makes aflatoxin analysis important in the international produce trade. For this reason, validation is important for the analysis of aflatoxin in hazelnuts. The limit of detection (LOD) and limit of quantification (LOQ) are two important parameters in validation. In this study, the LOD and LOQ values have been determined using the Association of Official Agricultural Chemists (AOAC) Method 991.31, which is one of the most viable high-performance liquid chromatography analysis methods in the analysis of aflatoxin in hazelnuts. Several approaches can be used to calculate LOD and LOQ values. In this study, to calculate the LOD and LOQ values, the visual evaluation (empirical) method, the signal-to-noise method, and calibration curve approaches were applied. The most appropriate approaches were compared. Our conclusion is that the visual evaluation method provided much more realistic LOD and LOQ values.