Marine biotoxins are produced by naturally occurring microalgae, whose populations can increase significantly under certain environmental conditions to form a harmful algal bloom (HAB). Marine biotoxins pose a significant food safety risk when bioaccumulated in shellfish that are ingested by humans. We describe the use of the Thermo Scientific Exactive benchtop LC/MS system powered by Orbitrap technology for screening lipophilic marine biotoxins commonly found in shellfish. The method was optimized using a standard mixture of marine biotoxins, and then applied to a mussel tissue extract.
Many countries have had to deal with the death of wild animals and domestic livestock due to toxic microalgal blooms in both marine and fresh water. Poisoning in humans has been associated with the direct consumption of shellfish, fish, or toxin-contaminated water. The foods most frequently involved in episodes of human poisoning are represented by bivalve molluscs. In accordance with current European regulations, we propose a quick, selective, sensitive, and accurate analytical method for the determination of lipophilic marine biotoxins in bivalve molluscs using an LC-MS/MS method.
