Detoxification of aflatoxin B₁ in corn by chlorine dioxide gas

Chlorine dioxide (ClO₂) gas was utilized for detoxifying aflatoxin B₁ (AFB₁) in corn for the first time. Four degradation compounds were identified by LC-MS as C₁₇H₁₃O₈, C₁₇H₁₅O₁₀, C₁₆H₁₅O₁₀, and C₁₅H₁₁O₈. Structurally, the biological activity of ClO₂-treated AFB₁ was removed due to the disappearance of C8-C9 double bond in the furan ring and the modification of cyclopentanone and methoxy after ClO₂ treatment. The cell viability assay on human embryo hepatocytes confirmed little toxicity of the degradation products. The degradation efficiency of AFB₁ on corn peaked near 90.0% under the optimized conditions and reached 79.6% for low initial contamination of AFB₁ at 5-20 μg/kg. Accordingly, ClO₂ has the potential to be developed into an effective, efficient, and economic approach to detoxify AFB₁ in grains.