Occurrence and Characterization of Fungi and Mycotoxins in Contaminated Medicinal Herbs.

ABSTRACT: Traditional medicinal herbs are widely used and may be contaminated with mycotoxigenic fungi during cultivation, harvesting, and storage, causing spoilage and mycotoxin production. We evaluated the predominant mycoflora and extent of mycotoxin contaminations in 48 contaminated samples of 13 different medicinal herbs. In total, 70.8% of herbs were slightly contaminated with aflatoxins (<5 μg kg^-1). Codonopsis radix samples contained ochratoxin A (OTA) (360-515 μg kg^-1), and Scutellariae radix samples contained OTA (49-231 μg kg^-1) and citrinin (15-53 μg kg^-1). Forty samples (83.3%) contained fungal contamination. Sixty-nine strains were characterized via morphological and molecular identification. The predominant mycoflora comprised four ge

SUBMITTER: Chen L 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC7020482 | biostudies-literature | 2020 Jan

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature