[Determination of saxitoxin in canned shellfish (author's transl)]

Poisonings by saxitoxin-containing shellfish occur regularly in shore areas. The reason is increased growth of the dinoflagellates Gonyaulax tamarensis and Gonyaulax catenella. Due to the widespread consumption of canned shellfish these kinds of poisoning also occurs in continental areas. Therefore it is necessary to determine saxitoxin in canned shellfish products. Because of their sensitivity fluorospectrophotometric determinations of saxitoxin are preferred. However, the methods described in the literature can only be applied to fresh shellfish. Consequently a method for the determination of saxitoxin in canned shellfish was developed. This method offers the advantage that parallel with the fluorophotometric determination a biotest with mice can be carried out with the same extract for forensic corroboration of the results. The extent of saxitoxin occurence in Spanish canned shellfish in Austria in the years 1976-1979 is described. Apparently the producers of canned shellfish were able to solve this problem since mid - 1978.