Scientists review ways to strip toxic mold chemical from grain
Sayed H, Tang Y, Guo Y, Zhao L
Food Safety
The wheat crackers or cornmeal in your pantry can pick up this estrogen-mimicking mold toxin during storage, and understanding how bacteria and enzymes neutralize it is what keeps that food supply safer.
A fungus called Fusarium that grows on corn, wheat, and other cereal crops can produce a hormone-mimicking toxin called zearalenone, and it sometimes hides in disguised chemical forms that turn back into the toxin once eaten. Researchers pulled together everything known about how this toxin forms, moves through the body, and can be broken down using microbes and enzymes, aiming to make grain-based food and animal feed safer.
Key Findings
Zearalenone is produced by Fusarium fungi and commonly contaminates cereal grains and their processed products.
Modified forms of zearalenone can be hydrolyzed back into the toxic parent compound during digestion, complicating risk assessment.
Microbial and enzymatic biodegradation strategies, including molecular engineering of degrading enzymes, show promise for detoxifying contaminated food and feed.
chevron_right Technical Summary
A toxic mold byproduct called zearalenone contaminates corn, wheat, and other grains worldwide, and this review rounds up the best science on how it forms, how it harms health, and which microbes and enzymes can break it down before it reaches food and feed.
Abstract Preview
Original paper
Zearalenone and its major modified forms: A comprehensive review of biosynthesis, toxicity, metabolism, and biodegradation strategies for food safety applications.
Zearalenone (ZEA) is a non-steroidal estrogenic mycotoxin produced by Fusarium species that commonly contaminates cereal grains and their derived products, thereby posing significant risks to publi...
open_in_new Read full abstractAbstract copyright held by the original publisher.
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