SBIR Phase I: Advanced Mycotoxin Detection with Novel Photochemical Diagnostics

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The broader impact of this Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Phase I project is improved sustainable food production. Mycotoxins are common contaminants found in cereal grains that can track through feed production and ultimately poison livestock animals. These poisoning events manifest as waste and inefficiency within human food supply chains. Animals consuming contaminated feed grow more slowly, produce less milk/eggs, are more susceptible to disease, etc. This equates to lost profits for the famers, lost meals for the consumer, and concerns over long-term food security. This SBIR Phase I project addresses this challenge through detection of these toxins. This technique offers a potentially transformative new tool in the field of point-of-source diagnostics, while simultaneously addressing the needs of the industry. This toxin detection system will be faster, simpler, and more versatile.The proposed project advances a new generation of mycotoxin detection technologies. This technique employs novel compounds designed to associate with a specific mycotoxin of interest to enable reliable quantitative detection. These detector compounds operate by changing the spectroscopic properties of the toxin, such that it can be detected even in complex biological mixtures like animal feed. The project investigates the extraction buffer composition and the detector compound design. The buffer and detector compound combinations will be optimized by characterizing the spectroscopic signatures under different excitation conditions. This research program will target the two key classes of mycotoxins most relevant to industry.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.