Scientific Opinion on the risks for animal and public health related to the presence ofAlternariatoxins in feed and food

Abstract

The European Commission asked the European Food Safety Authority to review the safety of Alternaria toxins in food and feed. In addition to causing plant diseases on many crops such as cereals, oilseeds, tomatoes, apples and olives, some of these toxins are genotoxic in vitro and/or fetotoxic in rats. This opinion deals with alternariol, alternariol monomethyl ether, tenuazonic acid, iso-tenuazonic acid, altertoxins, tentoxin, altenuene and AAL-toxins (Alternaria alternata f. sp. lycopersici toxins). Two Member States provided 11,730 occurrence results in food and also data published in the scientific literature were considered. Generally these toxins were found in grains and grain-based products, tomato and tomato products, sunflower seeds and sunflower oil, fruits and fruit products, and beer and wine. The feed occurrence data (1150 results) were collected from the literature only. The knowledge on toxic effects of Alternaria toxins on farm and companion animals and occurrence data in feed were insufficient to assess the health risk for different species. For chicken there are indications that alternariol represents a health risk but it cannot be excluded that tenuazonic acid could also be of concern. Considering: (1) there are few or no relevant toxicity data on Alternaria toxins, (2) the chemical structure of several of them is known, (3) dietary exposure data exist for some of them, the Panel on Contaminants in the food chain used the threshold of toxicological concern (TTC) approach to assess the relative level of concern for dietary exposure of humans to these mycotoxins. For the genotoxic Alternaria toxins, alternariol and alternariol monomethyl ether, the estimated chronic dietary exposure exceeded the relevant TTC value indicating a need for additional toxicity data. The dietary exposure estimates for nongenotoxic tentoxin and tenuazonic acid are lower than the relevant TTC value and are considered unlikely to be a human health concern. SUMMARYAlternaria toxins are mycotoxins produced by Alternaria species that cause plant diseases on many crops. They are the principal contaminating fungi in wheat, sorghum and barley, and have also been reported to occur in oilseeds such as sunflower and rapeseed, tomato, apples, citrus fruits, olives and several other fruits and vegetables. Alternaria alternata is the most common Alternaria species in harvested fruits and vegetables, and is the most important mycotoxin-producing species. Due to their growth even at low temperature, Alternaria species are also responsible for spoilage of these commodities during refrigerated transport and storage.Alternaria species produce more than 70 phytotoxins, but a small proportion of them have been chemically characterised and reported to act as mycotoxins to humans and animals. Some toxins such as alternariol (AOH), alternariol monomethyl ether (AME), tenuazonic acid (TeA) and altertoxins (ATX) are described to induce harmful effects in animals, including fetotoxic and teratogenic effects. Culture extracts of A. altern...

Tracking emerging mycotoxins in food: development of an LC-MS/MS method for free and modified Alternaria toxins

“…According to the recent EFSA report [19, 20], this is caused by a substantial lack of occurrence and toxicity data. The method presented here clearly fulfills the requirements for contributing important information on Alternaria toxin contamination patterns and levels.…”

“…The thresholds of toxicological concern (TTC values) were defined as 2.5 ng/kg body weight per day for the genotoxic compounds AOH and AME and 1500 ng/kg body weight per day for non-genotoxic TEN and TeA. Furthermore, EFSA clearly stated the critical need for more comprehensive toxicological characterization and exposure assessment of Alternaria toxins to enable a detailed risk assessment [19, 20]. …”

Identification and mycotoxigenic capacity of fungi associated with pre- and postharvest fruit rots of pomegranates in Greece and Cyprus

“…Apart from OTA, it was recently shown that strains of black aspergilli (A. niger and Aspergillus welwitchiae) possess putative fumonisin gene clusters and are able to produce fumonisins (B 2 and B 4 ) (Frisvad et al, 2011;Mogensen et al, 2010;Susca et al, 2014). Fumonisins are mainly associated with seed rots in cereals and maize caused by several Fusarium species and considered to be responsible for harmful effects on the health of humans or animals (Desjardins, 2006).…”

The mycotoxin alternariol suppresses lipopolysaccharide-induced inflammation in THP-1 derived macrophages targeting the NF-κB signalling pathway

“…Mycotoxins are naturally occurring secondary metabolites produced by a variety of fungal species that contaminate food and feed commodities and thus, might pose a risk to human and animal health (EFSA 2011). The fungal toxin alternariol (AOH), formed by Alternaria alternata , has been reported to possess genotoxic, cytotoxic and estrogenic potential as well as to induce oxidative stress, autophagy and senescence in vitro (Fehr et al 2009; Lehmann et al 2006; Solhaug et al 2014; Tiessen et al 2013).…”

“…per day for adults by far exceeds the threshold of toxicological concern (TTC) value for AOH (2.5 ng/kg b.w. per day) (EFSA 2011, 2016). Consequently, EFSA emphasized the necessity of additional data to characterise a potential hazard arising from AOH exposure (EFSA 2016).…”