Degradation of aflatoxin B1 in peanut meal by electron beam irradiation

The effects and safety of electron beam irradiation (EBI) treatment on the detoxification of aflatoxin B1 (AFB1) in the peanut meal were evaluated in this article. The AFB1 degradation was predominantly affected by both initial AFB1 and water concentrations. The degradation of AFB1 in the selected concentrations (0.5–5 ppm) was proven to follow pseudo first-order reaction kinetics (R2 > 0.95). The AFB1 degradation was faster when the initial concentration was 5 ppm and the moisture content was 21.47%, in comparison with the initial concentration of 1 ppm and 0.5 ppm and the moisture content of 14.32% and 8.74%, respectively. The Ames and cytotoxicity tests were employed to evaluate the residual toxicity of EBI-treated peanut meal. The mutagenic activity of EB-treated samples was completely lost compared with that of untreated samples and the degradation products in peanut meal has almost no cell toxicity.