Simultaneous preparation and characterization of three high-purity type B fumonisins from maize culture

Abstract

A reliable and large-scale preparative method was developed for the simultaneous preparation of high-purity fumonisin B₁ (FB₁), fumonisin B₂ (FB₂) and fumonisin B₃ (FB₃) from maize culture inoculated with Fusarium moniliforme in this study. The targeted B-series fumonisins (FBs) were firstly extracted with acetonitrile/water (50 : 50, v/v) and then purified using MAX cartridges. The subsequent chromatographic preparative procedures on a Unitary C₁₈ column (250 mm × 10 mm, 5 μm) and a SB-CN column (250 mm × 9.4 mm, 5 μm) were performed to effectively eliminate the other interferents to obtain the high-purity compounds. The prepared compounds were clearly identified to be FB₁, FB₂ and FB₃ using liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry (LC-MS/MS) and nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR). The purities were 96.25 ± 0.18%, 98.07 ± 0.18% and 97.36 ± 0.74% for FB₁, FB₂ and FB₃, respectively, which were determined by the external standard LC-MS/MS method. Within 72 h, large amounts of high-purity FB₁ (80 mg), FB₂ (16 mg) and FB₃ (16 mg) could be simultaneously prepared by the established approach.