The Higher Technical School of Agri-Food, Forestry and Veterinary Engineering of the University of Lleida is hosting today and tomorrow the annual meeting of the MICOFOOD congress, a national network that brings together researchers from a dozen universities and research centres in the field of mycotoxins and toxigenic fungi and their decontamination processes. The ultimate goal of this working group, of which Agrotecnio is a member, is to guarantee food safety, by going deeper into risk assessment and improving food quality.
This network focuses on the study of the different aspects related to toxigenic fungi and the mycotoxins they can produce in some foods, with the aim of defining the most relevant mycotoxin-producing species present in raw materials destined for human and animal foodstuffs. Another objective of the group is to establish rapid and reliable methods to detect these mycotoxigenic fungi and to assess the exposure of the population to food contamination. MICOFOOD also aims to deepen the relationship between researchers, the food industry and the health administration in order to minimise, as far as possible, the problems caused by the presence of toxic fungi in food, as well as to encourage and promote the implementation of quality control measures.
At the Lleida congress, experts will address research lines as diverse and from fields as different as toxicology, analytical chemistry, veterinary medicine and microbiology. The meeting included the inaugural lecture by Dr. Ángel Medina, from Cranfield University (England), on the effects of climate change on mycotoxins. Today’s sessions will focus on mycotoxin risk assessment, the application of molecular tools in mycotoxigenic fungi and mycotoxin impact mitigation strategies. Tomorrow, the sessions will focus on detoxification techniques and the detection of fungi and mycotoxins. UdL and Agrotecnio researcher Irene Teixido-Orries will present a paper on the ‘impact of the manufacture of oat beverages on the content and transfer of deoxynivalenol’. The workshop will be closed with a prize-giving ceremony for the best oral and poster presentation.
About Agrotecnio
The Fundación Centro de Investigación en Agrotecnologia, Agrotecnio, is an international CERCA centre of excellence in agri-food research. Its main objective is to develop high-impact translational research for the benefit of a wide range of stakeholders. Agrotecnio’s research draws on a wide range of expertise in agronomic and environmental sciences, animal sciences and food sciences with the concept of ‘one health’ in mind, an integrated and unifying approach to balance and optimise the health of people, animals and the environment.
At Agrotecnio there are 15 research groups from three main areas (plant, animal and food) belonging to two Catalan universities, the University of Lleida (UdL) and the University of Barcelona (UB). Created in 2012, the centre is located on the ETSEAFIV campus of the UdL and is part of the CERCA system (Research Centres of Catalonia).