**1. Introduction**

Mycotoxins are low-molecular-weight nature products as secondary metabolites by filamentous fungi or mold, which display overlapping toxicities to invertebrates, plants, and microorganism. The term mycotoxin was coined in 1962 in the aftermath of unusual veterinary crisis close to London, England, where nearly 100,000 turkey poultry died. It came out that was linked to peanut meal contaminated by aflatoxins. Now, more than 300 mycotoxins are found; however, only very few mycotoxins caught scientists' eyeball, which have been proven to be carcinogenic and toxic.

Human food can be contaminated with mycotoxins during storage. One of the principal classes of highly toxic carcinogenic mycotoxins is the metabolite of *Aspergillus flavus* and *Aspergillus parasiticus* aflatoxins [1]. Aflatoxins are classified into such four compounds as aflatoxin B1 (AFB1), aflatoxin B2 (AFB2), aflatoxin G1 (AFG1), and aflatoxin G2 (AFG2) based on their fluorescence under UV light (blue or green), and in the milk it was aflatoxin M1 (AFM1) and aflatoxin M2 (AFM2) which are the metabolites of AFB1 and AFB2, respectively [2–4]. The toxic effect

upon the living organisms of aflatoxin decreases in an order B1, G1, B2, and G2 [5]. AFB1 is the most potent carcinogenic agent associated with hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC), one of the most lethal and common cancers in the world, especially in Asia and Africa. The mycotoxin aflatoxin B1 (AFB1), the most notorious liver carcinogen, has been proven to be genotoxic. Epidemiological studies have shown that chronic exposure to aflatoxin B1 in the diet is one of the important factors in the etiology of liver cancer in experimental animal models, including rats and rainbow trouts [6].

Discovery of practical and economical procedure to prevent aflatoxin contamination, detect and degrade *Aspergillus* fungi contamination, and lower the concentration of AFB1 in the foodstuffs is of the primary task to prevent or eliminate the aflatoxin risk.

*Aspergillus* fungi is ubiquitously found in the soil and contaminates the crops in the field and during storage, such as maize, groundnuts, rice, and so on. Mycotoxins are the low-molecular weight nature products as the secondary metabolites of molds that make the industrial factories lose money resulting from condemnation of contaminated crops. They have been detected in various commodities such as maize, wheat, barley, oilseed, peanut, and beverages made from contaminated grains and other foods. Thus direct exposure to aflatoxin-contaminated commodities may impose a great risk to the consumers.

Unquestionably, prevention is the best method to control mycotoxin contamination. As the result of the high prevalence of AFB1 in the foods, many strategies are being developed to prevent or remove AFB1 contamination. In general, two ways are available to prevent AFB1 from contamination: pre- and postharvest treatment. Pre-harvest techniques are the first barrier to prevent mycotoxin contamination in all kinds of grains or feed. Pre-harvest techniques include the use of genetically altered crops that are resistant to *Aspergillus* infection and environmental stressors, pesticide usage, crop rotation, and timing of planting. Postharvest strategies include physical methods (proper drying, packaging, storage, preservative/pesticide usage). These strategies play the roles as the preventative measures to reduce the chance and the amount of contaminations that are introduced to the crops. However, these strategies fail to prevent the contaminations fully and effectively; thus some postharvest techniques are being developed to degrade or reduce AFB1 contamination. In this review, we aimed to investigate AFB1 decontamination methods, including several traditional strategies, and update some new methods.
