Electromembrane extraction coupled with UPLC-FLD for the determination of ochratoxin A in food crops

Ochratoxin A (OTA) contamination in food crops has sparked global concern for potential health risk to humans and animals. A simple, accurate and sensitive method was developed for the determination of OTA using electromembrane extraction (EME) coupled with ultra-high performance liquid chromatography-fluorescence detector (UPLC-FLD). By optimizing the important factors, EME showed good performance for the extraction of OTA in spiked corn flour sample. Using the developed EME-UPLC-FLD method, good linearity for OTA was achieved in the range of 1–100 ng mL −1 , and the limit of detection (LOD) was 0.02306 μg kg −1 , which was well below the established maximum residue limit. The proposed method was successfully applied for the determination of trace OTA in multiple matrices (corn flour extract, corn flour slurry and soybean milk) with satisfactory recoveries ranging from 80.01 % to 116.7 % at four spiked levels, which has great potential to analyze trace chemical contaminant in food crops. • EME achieved extraction, clean-up, and enrichment of OTA with high performance in one step. • EME-UPLC method was successfully applied to analyze OTA in corn flour and soybean milk. • The LOD of this method was well below the established maximum residue limit.