LC-MS/MS Determination of Antibiotic Residues in Distillers Grains: Method Modification.

Background: Antibiotics are used in ethanol production to discourage undesirable bacteria growth. To determine if antibiotic residues remain in the distillers grain (DG) byproduct, which is used as an animal food ingredient, the U.S.

A Dilute-and-Shoot UHPLC-MS/MS Isotope Dilution Method for Simultaneous Determination and Confirmation of 11 Mycotoxins in Dried Distiller's Grains with Solubles.

Background: Natural contamination with mycotoxins in dried distiller's grains with solubles (DDGS) as a mainstream animal feed ingredient poses a risk to animal health.

Objective: A regulatory method was needed for the agency to simultaneously detect 11 mycotoxins of high regulatory priority in DDGS.

Methods: A DDGS sample (10 g) was extracted twice with acetonitrile-water under mildly acidic condition.

Reproductive toxicity in rats with crystal nephropathy following high doses of oral melamine or cyanuric acid.

The industrial chemical melamine was used in 2007 and 2008 to raise the apparent protein content in pet feed and watered down milk, respectively. Because humans may be exposed to melamine via several different routes into the human diet as well as deliberate contamination, this study was designed to characterize the effect of high dose melamine or cyanuric acid oral exposure on the pregnant animal and developing fetus, including placental transfer. Clear rectangular crystals formed following a single triazine exposure which is a different morphology from the golden spherulites caused by combined exposure or the calculi formed when melamine combines with endogenous uric acid.

Depletion of melamine and cyanuric acid in kidney of catfish Ictalurus punctatus and trout Oncorhynchus mykiss.

A risk assessment conducted in 2007 identified significant knowledge gaps about tissue residues of melamine and related triazine analogs such as cyanuric acid in animals that had eaten contaminated food. The USFDA subsequently designed studies to determine residue levels in muscle, serum, and kidneys of catfish and trout given a single gavage dose of 20 mg/kg body weight (BW) of melamine, cyanuric acid, or 20 mg/kg BW of both compounds simultaneously. Renal triazines were determined by LC-MS/MS at postdose days 1, 3, 7, 14, 28 (and day 42 for trout).