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ARS Home » Southeast Area » New Orleans, Louisiana » Southern Regional Research Center » Food and Feed Safety Research » Research » Publications at this Location » Publication #341558
Research Project: Use of Classical and Molecular Technologies for Developing Aflatoxin Resistance in Crops

Location: Food and Feed Safety Research

Title: Detecting peanuts inoculated with toxigenic and atoxienic Aspergillus flavus strains with fluorescence hyperspectral imagery

Author
item XING, FUGUO - Mississippi State University
item YAO, HAIBO - Mississippi State University
item HRUSKA, ZUZANA - Mississippi State University
item KINCAID, RUSSELL - Mississippi State University
item ZHU, FENGLE - Mississippi State University
item Brown, Robert
item Bhatnagar, Deepak
item LIU, YANG - Chinese Academy Of Agricultural Sciences

Submitted to: Proceedings of SPIE
Publication Type: Proceedings
Publication Acceptance Date: 4/19/2017
Publication Date: 5/17/2017
Citation: Xing, F., Yao, H., Hruska, Z., Kincaid, R., Zhu, F., Brown, R.L., Bhatnagar, D., Liu, Y. 2017. Detecting peanuts inoculated with toxigenic and atoxienic Aspergillus flavus strains with fluorescence hyperspectral imagery. In: Proceedings of SPIE 10217, Sensing for Agriculture and Food Quality and Safety IX, April 11-15, 2017, Anaheim, CA. 10217:1021701-1021708. doi: 10.1117/12.2262801.

Interpretive Summary:

Technical Abstract: Aflatoxin contamination in peanut products has been an important and long-standing problem around the world. Produced mainly by Aspergillus flavus and Aspergillus parasiticus, aflatoxins are the most toxic and carcinogenic compounds among toxins. This study investigated the application of fluorescence visible near-infrared (VNIR) hyperspectral images to assess the spectral difference between peanut kernels inoculated with toxigenic and atoxigenic inocula of A. flavus and healthy kernels. Peanut kernels were inoculated with NRRL3357, a toxigenic strain of A. flavus, and AF36, an atoxigenic strain of A. flavus, respectively. Fluorescence hyperspectral images under ultraviolet (UV) excitation were recorded on peanut kernels with and without skin. Contaminated kernels exhibited different fluorescence features compared with healthy kernels. For the kernels without skin, the inoculated kernels had a fluorescence peaks shifted to longer wavelengths with lower intensity than healthy kernels. In addition, the fluorescence intensity of peanuts without skin was higher than that of peanuts with skin (10 times). The fluorescence spectra of kernels with skin are significantly different from that of the control group (p<0.001). Furthermore, the fluorescence intensity of the toxigenic, AF3357 peanuts with skin was lower than that of the atoxigenic AF36 group. Discriminate analysis showed that the inoculation group can be separated from the controls with 100% accuracy. However, the two inoculation groups (AF3357 vis AF36) can be separated with only ~80% accuracy. This study demonstrated the potential of fluorescence hyperspectral imaging techniques for screening of peanut kernels contaminated with A. flavus, which could potentially lead to the production of rapid and non-destructive scanning-based detection technology for the peanut industry.