Metabolomics as an emerging approach for deciphering the biological impact and toxicity of food contaminants: the case of mycotoxins.

Exposure to mycotoxins through the dietary route occurs on a daily basis while their deleterious effects are exhibited in the form of ailments, such as inflammation, cancer, and hormonal imbalance. The negative impact of mycotoxins can be attributed to their interaction with various biomolecules and their interference in metabolic pathways. The activity of biomolecules, such as enzymes/receptors, which engage the intricate mechanism of endogenous metabolism, is more susceptible to disruption by metabolites of high toxicity, which gives rise to adverse health effects. Metabolomics is a useful analytical approach that can assist in unraveling such information. It can simultaneously and comprehensively analyze a large number of endogenous and exogenous molecules present in biofluids and can, thus, reveal biologically relevant perturbations following mycotoxin exposure. Information provided by genome, transcriptome and proteome analyses, which have been utilized for the elucidation of biological mechanisms so far, are further complemented by the addition of metabolomics in the available bioanalytics toolbox. Metabolomics can offer insight into complex biological processes and their respective response to several (co-)exposures. This review focuses on the most extensively studied mycotoxins reported in literature and their respective impact on the metabolome upon exposure.