Occurrence of mycotoxins of the beauvericin and enniatin groups in infant foods and risk assessment study

The aim of this study was the determination of mycotoxins belonging to beauvericin and enniatin groups in infant foods to be considered for the assessment of dietary exposure. The extraction phase with acetonitrile was followed by a purification step before liquid chromatography-mass spectrometry analysis. The method was suitable to detect these mycotoxins in different categories of infant foods (cereal-based creams, biscuits, and pasta) at concentrations between 0.30 μg/kg for beauvericin and enniatin A and 0.60 μg/kg for the remaining enniatins (A1, B and B1) up to a maximum of 20 μg/kg. Beauvericin was the most detected mycotoxin in pasta samples (15%) at a maximum concentration of 1.1 μg/kg, while enniatin B showed the highest presence (90%) in biscuits, at levels ranging from 0.63 to 11 μg/kg. Enniatin B1 was found in all matrices at comparable ranks of positivity, with the highest occurrence rate (30%) in biscuits. The highest estimated daily intake was observed in infant consumers aged 1–3 years and was associated with the consumption of biscuits, followed by samples of pasta and cereal-based creams. It was higher in infants than in children aged 4–9 years due to consumption data expressed per kg of body weight. The lowest estimated daily intake was obtained for beauvericin in all matrices as its concentrations were lower than those of the enniatin group. The results of this study highlighted the need to implement monitoring also for these mycotoxin groups, paying particular attention to infants as a high-risk category.