Topics in pesticide residue analysis: Assessment of contamination of surface water and fish from Cote d'Ivoire and the evaluation of immunoassays for detection of pesticides in plant and fish samples.

摘要

The developing world, has focused on producing more food to feed the growing population. To do so, farmers must not only rely on improved seeds and mechanization but also on fertilizer and pesticides. As in the developed world, the assessment of contamination of the environment by these chemicals should be of great concern. For this reason, water and fish samples were collected from selected rivers and lagoons from Cote d'Ivoire and were brought to the USA to be analyzed. The physico-chemical characteristics values indicate that these water are suitable for drinking. Only two metals, zinc and copper were detected at very low levels (range and values). The levels of organochlorine pesticides detected in water and fish samples were below the extraneous residue limits (ERL) and the acceptable daily intake set by the FAO/WHO codex alimentaruis commission. The levels were higher in the south of the country where agriculture is more intensified and in urban areas compared to the north and rural areas. These results indicate that agricultural and industrial activities are the most important source of surface water contamination by xenobiotics. Three commercially available immunoassay kits from different manufacturers were evaluated for the determination of pesticides, as an alternative to gas chromatographic (GC) methods used for the determination of organochlorine pesticides. Interference due to fish and corn leaf coextracts was corrected with dilution using distillate water. The resulting assays showed good reproducibility and accuracy and had an estimated limit of pesticide detection of 0.25 ppb in fish and plant material. The results of the study indicated that the two types of immunoassay kits gave similar results in the detection of alachlor, atrazine, and carbofuran in corn leaf and fish fillet but the Ohmicron RaPID Assays