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C2-IL: FORMATION OF CENTER OF EXCELLENCE FOR FOOD SAFETY AND EMERGING RISKS

Biljana Škrbić, Nataša Đurišić-Mladenović

Faculty of Technology, University of Novi Sad,
Bulevar Cara Lazara 1, 21 000 Novi Sad, Republic of Serbia, e-mail: biljana@tf.uns.ac.rs

 

The European Commission (EC) through the REGPOT calls within FP7-CAPACITIES programme offers an opportunity to the less developed regions to significantly upgrade the resources, stimulating the realization of the full research potentials of the enlarged European Union. CEFSER is the FP-REGPOT project (GA 229629) dedicated to the reinforcement of research capacities at the Laboratory for Chemical Contaminants in Food and the Environment at the Faculty of Technology, University of Novi Sad, Serbia, in order to become a unique Western Balkan Country Centre of Excellence in Food Safety and Emerging Risks. Through CEFSER, the lab equipment is substantially reinforced primarily with installation of the highly sophisticated ultra performance liquid chromatograph with triple quadrupole mass spectrometer (UHPLC-MS/MS) and UHPLC with high-resolution mass spectrometer with patented Orbitrap technology. In this way, the lab is fully equipped for the analysis of known and emerging contaminants in food and the environment, representing a modern analytical centre and an attractive partner for the joint research. CEFSER project, by having objectives such as capital investments in a highly sophisticated analytical instrument, upgrading of the existing equipment, reinforcement of the human resources (hiring, mobility, etc), and networking with advanced EU institutions, integrates the Laboratory for Chemical Contaminants and the Faculty of Technology within the European Research Area, contributing to general harmonization of R&D within the areas of food safety and emerging risks, which are the global challenges with great health, economic, and legal consequences. Through this presentation, the CEFSER equipment, team, research agenda and dissemination activities will be described. Special attention will be paid to the current research challenges of the CEFSER lab, including the analysis of mycotoxins, polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons, and emerging pollutants in various food matrices.

Namely, determination of mycotoxins in food and feed is of great importance because of their variety of toxic effects on humans and animals, such as cytotoxic, carcinogenic, mutagenic and immunosuppressive. The demonstrated toxic effects of such toxins, has prompted the European Commission as well as corresponding National authorities to put forward proposals to set maximum levels for presence of several mycotoxins in foodstuffs. In the analysis of mycotoxins UHPLC–MS/MS have become very popular, because of the universal, selective, and sensitive detection. Currently, there is a strong trend toward multi-mycotoxin methods for the simultaneous determination of mycotoxins belonging to different chemical families. The method for the analysis of mycotoxins in different food matrices has been developed on the newly purchased UHPLC-MS/MS instrument, and the lab already participated in the interlaboratory study organized by EC Institute for Reference Materials and Measurements. Also, the method for the analysis of multi-mycotoxin mixtures was transferred from triple quadrupole to Orbitrap mass analyzer, enabling the high resolution accurate mass screening.

Methods for the analysis of PAHs by utilizing UHPLC-MS/MS in combination with the atmospheric pressure photoionization (APPI), the youngest among the methods of soft ionization in mass spectrometry, are undeveloped, with little research and development invested in it. Our goal has been development of successful method for the analysis of very low (sub-ppb) amounts of PAHs in food employing the highly sophisticated UHPLC-APPI/MS/MS analytical instrument.

Emerging pollutants like perfluorinated compounds have been a subject of our research and with the support of the outstanding EU research teams, well known in the area of food safety and advanced analytical instrumentation, that supports CEFSER, we have developed new UHPLC-MS/MS method for their determination in various matrices.

 

Prof. Dr. Biljana Škrbić is a Full Professor at the Faculty of Technology, University of Novi Sad, she has significant experience in coordination and leadership of research projects at both national and international level with strong background in food quality and safety, environmental impacts on food chain, environmental pollution and protection, chemometrics, etc.; founder and head of the Laboratory for Chemical Contaminants in the Environment and Food at Faculty of Technology; coordinator of FP7 project “CEFSER” GA no. 229629, scored with 15/15; expert evaluator of the projects submitted to the calls of FP7-KBBE Theme 2 programme, FP7-IRSES People programme, the Serbian Ministry for Science, SEE-ERA.NET FP6 project, and Slovak Research and Development Agency.