Analysis and evaluation of in vitro bioaccessibility of aflatoxins B1, B2, G1 and G2 in plant-based milks.

Plant-based milks emerge as a healthy and vegan alternative for human diet, but these foodstuffs are susceptible to be contaminated by aflatoxins. A new method based on SPE and HPLC-MS/MS analysis was optimized and validated to test the presence of aflatoxins B1, B2, G1 and G2 analysis in almond, oat, rice and soy commercial milks. Moreover, aflatoxin bioaccessibility was evaluated through an in vitro digestion assay applied to each type of spiked milk.

Aflatoxin detoxification by thermal cooking treatment and evaluation of in vitro bioaccessibility from white and brown rice.

Aflatoxins pose a severe risk to the human health. In this study, the detoxifying capacity of a thermal cooking treatment applied to white and brown rice spiked with aflatoxins B1, B2, G1 and G2 as well as the aflatoxin bioaccessibility in cooked rice after applying an in vitro digestion model was evaluated. The cooking treatment (boiling with water at 100 °C for 12 min) evidenced an important extraction capacity of the boiling water over aflatoxins (25 %-56 %), that was higher for brown rice.

Festivals following the easing of COVID-19 restrictions: Prevalence of new psychoactive substances and illicit drugs.

The market for illicit drugs and new psychoactive substances (NPS) has grown significantly and people attending festivals have been identified as being at high risk (high extent and frequency of substance use). Traditional public health surveillance data sources have limitations (high costs, long implementation times, and ethical issues) and wastewater-based epidemiology (WBE) can cost-effectively support surveillance efforts. Influent wastewater samples were analyzed for NPS and illicit drug consumption collected during New Year period (from 29-Dec-2021 to 4-Jan-2022) and a summer Festival (from 29-June-2022 to 12-July-2022) in a large city in Spain.

Cytotoxicity, uptake and accumulation of selenium nanoparticles and other selenium species in neuroblastoma cell lines related to Alzheimer's disease by using cytotoxicity assays, TEM and single cell-ICP-MS.

Alzheimer's disease (AD) is the most prevalent neurodegenerative disease, representing 80% of the total dementia cases. The "amyloid cascade hypothesis" stablishes that the aggregation of the beta-amyloid protein (Aβ) is the first event that subsequently triggers AD development. Selenium nanoparticles stabilized with chitosan (Ch-SeNPs) have demonstrated excellent anti-amyloidogenic properties in previous works, leading to an improvement of AD aetiology.

Simultaneous determination of aflatoxins B1, B2, G1 and G2 in commercial rices using immunoaffinity column clean-up and HPLC-MS/MS.

Rice is frequently contaminated with aflatoxins, that are highly toxic fungal substances and strongly involved on hepatic cancer. In this work, different extraction and clean-up methods were evaluated for the simultaneous extraction and clean-up of aflatoxins B1, B2, G1 and G2 from rice. Favourable results were obtained by using methanol - water (80:20, v/v) extraction followed by immunoaffinity columns for clean-up, with recoveries of 86-92%, standard deviations between 5 and 11%, LOD ranged between 0.

Ability of selenium species to inhibit metal-induced Aβ aggregation involved in the development of Alzheimer's disease.

Extracellular accumulation of amyloid beta peptide (Aβ) is believed to be one of the main factors responsible for neurodegeneration in Alzheimer's disease (AD). Metals could induce Aβ aggregation, by their redox activity or binding properties to amyloid β fibrils, leading to their accumulation and deposition outside neurons. For this reason, metal chelation may have an acknowledged part to play in AD prevention and treatment.