Simultaneous Detection of Ochratoxin A and Aflatoxins in Industrial and Traditional Red and isot Pepper Flakes along with Dietary Exposure Risk Assessment

This study focused on the co-occurrence of aflatoxins (AFs) and ochratoxin A (OTA) in traditionally and industrially dried red pepper flakes (DRPFs) and isot pepper flakes (IPFs). Following the multitoxin immunoaffinity column (IAC) clean-up, high-performance liquid chromatography coupled with fluorescence detection (HPLC-FLD) was used to quantify AFs and OTA. The limit of detection (LOD) and limit of quantification (LOQ) values were 0.11 and 0.18 μg kg^–1 (AFB₁), 0.04 and 0.08 μg kg^–1 (AFB₂), 0.13 and 0.18 μg kg^–1 (AFG₁), 0.04 and 0.11 μg kg^–1 (AFG₂), and 0.10 and 0.21 μg kg^–1 (OTA), respectively. AFB_1, AFB₂, AFG₁, and OTA were found to be positive in 93, 74, 17, and 94% of all samples, respectively. The contamination levels in positive samples ranged from 0.23 to 38.69, 0.04 to 2.14, 0.13 to 0.88, and 0.18 to 52.19 μg kg^–1 for AFB₁, AFB₂, AFG₁, and OTA, respectively, while no AFG₂ was found above the detection limit (0.04 μg kg^–1). None of the industrial isot peppers exceeded the European Union limits, while the levels of AFB₁ (5 μg kg^–1), total AFs (10 μg kg^–1), and OTA (20 μg kg^–1) of the traditional peppers were above the limit by 30% (16/54), 26% (14/54), and 4% (2/54), respectively. Co-occurrence of AFB₁-AFB₂-OTA was the most frequent, accounting for 54% (29/54) of all samples. At the upper bound (UB), estimated average exposure to AFB₁, total AFs, and OTA was determined to be 0.175, 0.189, and 0.124 ng kg^–1 bw day^–1 in all samples, respectively. The margin of exposure (MoE) value of AFB₁ and total AFs was found to be 977 and 909, indicating high health concerns compared to OTA (MoE >10,000). AFB₁ and total AFs may result in 0.0058 and 0.0062 liver cancer cases/100,000 person/year at UB, respectively, and weekly OTA exposure was 0.868 ng kg^–1 bw, well below the provisional tolerable weekly intake, hence not of health concern. AFs exposure could endanger health, whereas OTA posed no toxicological concerns through dried red pepper consumption