Phytoprevention of aflatoxin production

Consumption of mycotoxic foods is associated with several cases ofhuman poisoning, or mycotoxicosis, sometimes resulting in death.objective: phytopreventive inhibition of aspergillus parasiticus growth and its aflatoxinproduction by the essential oils extracted from thymus kotschyanus boiss & hohen andzataria multiflora boiss. is reported in this study.methods: minimal inhibitory concentration (mic), minimal fungicidal concentration(mfc) and fungicidal kinetics of the oils were determined and compared with each other.results: the oils from the above mentioned plants were found to be strongly fungicidaland inhibitory to aflatoxin production. both oils inhibited aflatoxin b1 (afb1) productionby a.parasiticus. t. kotschyanus and z. multiflora oils at 25 ppm concentration, reducedafb1 levels by 100% and 47.87% respectively. aflatoxin production was significantlyinhibited at lower than fungistatic concentration of both oils. the analysis of oils by gcand gc/ms led to identification of 27 and 22 components in t. kotschyanus andz. multiflora boiss. respectively which were very similar to each other.conclusion: prevention of fungal growth and aflatoxin production by naturalcompounds is recommended.