Determination of aflatoxins in peanut butter and sesame samples using high-performance liquid chromatography method

In this study, total number of samples analysed were 20 packages of sesame and 20 cans of peanut butter, which were collected from Ankara local markets, Turkey. Extraction and determination of aflatoxins have been made by immunoaffinity column technique and high-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) method. Mean levels (+/- SE) of aflatoxins B-1, B-2, G(1) were found to be 15.756 +/- 3.129 ng/g, 1.232 +/- 0.244 ng/g and 9.689 +/- 1.005 ng/g, respectively in peanut butter samples. Regarding the sesame samples, mean level of aflatoxin G(1) was found to be 0.754 +/- 0.213 ng/g. Our data revealed that while aflatoxin levels found in sesame samples were within the Turkish Food Codex (TFC) values, for peanut butter samples, they were higher than the TFC values.