Biomonitoring of Mycotoxins in Plasma of Patients with Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s Disease

In the case of PD, the fact that the disease is accompanied by other non-motor symptoms in organs highly exposed to the environment (olfactory and gastrointestinal systems) reinforces the hypotheses of the role of environmental factors in the etiology of PD. Many chemicals such as pesticides, metals (iron and lead), polychlorinated biphenyls, solvents such as trichloroethylene, perchloroethylene as well a traffic particles have been linked to PD [14,15]. Among them, the stronger evidence points to pesticides [16]. Indeed, it is known that people living in rural areas, exposed to neurotoxins present in crops, and well and spring waters have been shown to be at higher risk of developing PD [17,18].Another group of compounds present in rural areas long before pesticides are mycotoxins. Mycotoxins are naturally-occurring contaminants produced by different fungal species such as Aspergillus, Penicillium and Fusarium, that contaminate crops, mainly cereals, nuts and vegetables worldwide. The economical agricultural losses are huge [19]; however, the main concern is related with human and farm animal health. They are known to cause severe and long-term diseases related with their hepatotoxic, nephrotoxic, immunotoxic, genotoxic and carcinogenic properties as well as their deleterious effects on the endocrine or reproductive systems [20,21,22]. Indeed, due to their toxic effects maximum limits in different foodstuffs, foods and feed have been laid down at EU level [23,24,25]. CLICK TO REVIEW