Citation:
A. Medina, N. Magan. Temperature and water activity effects on production of T-2 and HT-2 by Fusarium
langsethiae strains from north European countries. Food Microbiology, Volume 28, Issue 3, May 2011, pp392-398
Abstract:
This study has examined the effect of ecophysiological factors, water activity
(aw, 0.995-0.90) and temperature (10-37°C), on the T-2 and HT-2 toxins
production by Fusarium langsethiae. Two dimensional profiles for optimum and
marginal conditions have been built for two strains from each of four northern
European countries (UK, Norway, Sweden, Finland) on an oat-based medium. This
showed thatthe optimum aw and temperature conditions for T-2+HT-2 production was
between 0.98-0.995, and 20-30°C respectively. Kruskal-Wallis analysis of ranks
showed a statistically significant differences between the different aw levels
examined (P<0.001) but no significant effect of the temperatures examined. The
ratio of HT-2/T-2 was investigated and non-uniform distribution of HT-2 toxin
was found under different ecological conditions. No statistically significant
differences were found for the mean toxin production between strains from the
different countries. Intra-strain differences in toxin production was only found
for those from Finland (P-value=0.0247). The growth/no growth and toxin/no toxin
conditions in relation to awxtemperature have been constructed for the first
time. This knowledge will be useful in developing prevention strategies to
minimise T-2 and HT-2 toxin contamination by strains of F. langsethiae on
important small grain cereal