Zama Mthembu
University of KwaZulu Natal, South Africa
Title: Detection of cyanotoxins and measurements of microcystins in South African surface waters by High Performance Liquid Chromatography (HPLC)
Biography
Biography: Zama Mthembu
Abstract
Cyanobacteria, an algae bloom responsible for the creation of deadly toxins. These toxins have the potential to adversely impact human and animal health. Microcystins (MCs), are harmful toxins that are produced by cyanobacteria species and the most investigated toxins worldwide. However, in South Africa their occurrence statistics are deficient due to inaccessibility of reliable, sensitive, and precise analytical methods to investigate them in water surfaces. Thus, a development of analytical methods for the detection and accurate quantification of algal toxins is crucial to consider the health risk of exposure to toxins in wastewater and surface waters. This study recommends an analytical method for the detection and quantification of algal toxins using solid phase extraction (SPE) and high-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) coupled with photodiode detector (PDA). The developed method was validated based on linearity which ranged from 3 – 2500 µg L-1, recoveries at 99.6 – 113.9%, the limit of detection (LOD) ranging from 0.2 – 480 µg L-1, and limit of quantification (LOQ) at 0.7 – 160 µg L-1 and the regression coefficients obtained were above 0.9880 in all targeted analytes. The developed method was applied to some of KwaZulu Natal surface water and Darville wastewater treatment plant, South Africa. MC-RR was the most detected analyte at concentration ranging from 0.069 ng L-1 – 30.521 ng L-1 compared to other targeted MCs. The developed method is simple and cheap, which can consent developing countries to monitor these deadly MC toxins in water surfaces.