**Abstract**

Mycotoxins are chemically diverse and capable of inducing a wide diversity of acute and chronic symptoms, ranging from feed refusal to rapid death. Accurate detection and monitoring of mycotoxins is an essential component of the prevention, diagnosis, and remediation of mycotoxin-related issues in livestock and human food. Current trends in food analysis are focusing on the application of fast, simple procedure needed, and low-cost biosensor technologies that can detect with high sensitivity and selectivity different compounds associated with food safety. This chapter discussed the recent analytical methods-based biosensor technology for quantification of mycotoxins in food products. Mainly focus on the biosensor technology based on the immobilization of antibodies onto various nanomaterials such as nanoparticles, graphite, carbon nanotubes, and quantum dots. The nanomaterials are able to be functionalized with various biomolecules such as enzymes, antibodies, nucleic acids, DNA/RNA aptamers, bio- or artificial receptors that make them suitable for detection of various substances such as food toxins, bacteria, and other compounds important in food analysis. All the nanomaterials provide an effective platform for achieving high sensitivity that is similar and, in some cases, even better than conventional analytical methods. We believe that future trends will be emphasized on improving biosensor properties toward practical application in the food industry.

**Keywords:** mycotoxin, biosensor, nanomaterials, analytical methods, fungi

### **1. Introduction**

Fungi are an organism that exists either in single-celled or complex multicellular organisms. This number of the organism may cause diseases by producing toxic substances which known as mycotoxins. Mycotoxins are toxic secondary metabolites of various fungi that significantly impact global food safety and security, from toxin exposure, economic loss of crops, or the salability of said crops. They are a widespread mixture of contaminants in various agricultural and food products, with both acute and chronic toxicological effects on human health [1]. Mycotoxin produced mainly by mycelial structure of filamentous fungi or specifically molds that may cause a harmful effect to animals as well as humans such as carcinogenic, nephrotoxicity, mutagenic, immunosuppressive, estrogenic neurotoxicity, reproductive and developmental toxicity, hepatotoxicity and indigestion [2].

Mycotoxins including aflatoxins (AFs), ochratoxins (OT), trichothecenes, zearalenone (ZEN), fumonisins (F), tremorgenic toxins, and ergot alkaloids mostly affect the public health and agro-economic significance. Factors affecting the magnitude of toxicity to the living organism are by consuming mycotoxin-contaminated foods or feeds, including species, mechanisms/modes of action, metabolism, and defense mechanisms [3]. Most of the countries agreed to set the limits of mycotoxins present in food because of the effects of the mycotoxins to human health. The permitted level is slightly different, which depends on the type of food products. The minimum limits for mycotoxins in single ppb (part per billion) and even below (0.05 ppb for infant foods) are established in EU, with similar standards in China and Japan [4].

Guan et al. [5] reported about 98% of the agricultural commodities, including corn, compound animal feeds, silage, cornmeal, puffed corn, wheat, bran, soybean meal, rapeseed meal, cottonseed meal and whole cottonseed content various group of mycotoxins. Besides, Smith et al. [6] stated that several mycotoxins contaminate approximately 48% of 7049 feedstuffs. Thus, it is essential to detect mycotoxins in the food industry to address the mycotoxin-related health issues to humans and animals effectively.

Conventional techniques such as thin-layer chromatography (TLC), highperformance liquid chromatography (HPLC) and mass spectrometry have been suggested by international organizations as standard approaches to study the occurrence of mycotoxins in food products [7]. Besides, enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) had been widely used to identify different types of mycotoxins. However, it has slight defects of cross-reactivity and possible false-positive or falsenegative outcomes [8]. Also, those techniques usually costly and available in a specialized research laboratory needs highly personnel trained and laborious. Recently, advanced methods used to detect the presence of mycotoxins in food samples, which show high sensitivity, low cost, simple operation, and portable on-field use [9]. Besides, portable and easy-to-use biosensor devices suitable for express, in-field detection of mycotoxins. The development of biosensors for mycotoxins has risen sharply in the last decade with a large number of different bio-sensing technologies application. Zheng et al. (2006) reported biosensor as rapid methods which typically cost-effective, easy to be handled as well as a portable device to be used in an interchanging site compared to laboratory analysis.
