Mycotoxins in animal and human patients.

The majority of human food and animal feed production occurs in a highly managed agroecosystem. Management decisions include variety grown, tillage and irrigation methods and practices, fertilization, pest and disease control, harvesting methods, and storage and transportation practices. This system is generally managed for optimum returns to labor and capital investments. The spores of toxigenic fungi have ubiquitous distribution and toxigenic fungi exploit food sources when conditions of moisture and temperature are above minimums for growth. The safety margins in the agroecosystem are close and are influenced by extrinsic factors such as climatic events. Control of fungal growth is important in management of raw feedstuffs, foodstuffs, condiments-spices, botanicals, and other consumable substances as they are grown, harvested, stored, and transported. The risk factors for mycotoxin production are weather conditions during crop growth and when the crop is mature, damage to seeds before, during, and after harvest, how commodities are physically handled, the presence of weed seeds and other foreign material in grain, and how commodity moisture and temperature are managed during storage and transportation. Diversion of commodities and by-products from human consumption to animal feedstuffs can increase the risk of mycotoxicoses in animals. The toxicology of selected toxigenic fungi and the mycotoxins they produce are reviewed.