Reports from University of Illinois Describe Recent Advances in Risk Management (Evaluation of the Impact of Skewness, Clustering, and Probe Sampling Plan On Aflatoxin Detection In Corn)

2021 APR 16 (NewsRx) -- By a News Reporter-Staff News Editor at Insurance Daily News -- Data detailed on Risk Management have been presented. According to news reporting originating from Urbana, Illinois, by NewsRx correspondents, research stated, “Probe sampling plans for aflatoxin in corn attempt to reliably estimate concentrations in bulk corn given complications like skewed contamination distribution and hotspots. To evaluate and improve sampling plans, three sampling strategies (simple random sampling, stratified random sampling, systematic sampling with U.S.”

Financial support for this research came from International Life Sciences Institute (ILSI) North America Food Microbiology Committee.

Our news editors obtained a quote from the research from the University of Illinois, “GIPSA sampling schemes), three numbers of probes (5, 10, 100, the last a proxy for autosampling), four clustering levels (1, 10, 100, 1,000 kernels/cluster source), and six aflatoxin concentrations (5, 10, 20, 40, 80, 100 ppb) were assessed by Monte-Carlo simulation. Aflatoxin distribution was approximated by PERT and Gamma distributions of experimental aflatoxin data for uncontaminated and naturally contaminated single kernels. The model was validated against published data repeatedly sampling 18 grain lots contaminated with 5.8-680 ppb aflatoxin. All empirical acceptance probabilities fell within the range of simulated acceptance probabilities. Sensitivity analysis with partial rank correlation coefficients found acceptance probability more sensitive to aflatoxin concentration (-0.87) and clustering level (0.28) than number of probes (-0.09) and sampling strategy (0.04). Comparison of operating characteristic curves indicate all sampling strategies have similar average performance at the 20 ppb threshold (0.8-3.5% absolute marginal change), but systematic sampling has larger variability at clustering levels above 100. Taking extra probes improves detection (1.8% increase in absolute marginal change) when aflatoxin is spatially clustered at 1,000 kernels/cluster, but not when contaminated grains are homogenously distributed. Therefore, taking many small samples, for example, autosampling, may increase sampling plan reliability.”

According to the news editors, the research concluded: “The simulation is provided as an R Shiny web app for stakeholder use evaluating grain sampling plans.”

This research has been peer-reviewed.

For more information on this research see: Evaluation of the Impact of Skewness, Clustering, and Probe Sampling Plan On Aflatoxin Detection In Corn. Risk Analysis, 2021. Risk Analysis can be contacted at: Wiley, 111 River St, Hoboken 07030-5774, NJ, USA. (Wiley-Blackwell - http://www.wiley.com/; Risk Analysis - http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/journal/10.1111/(ISSN)1539-6924)

The news editors report that additional information may be obtained by contacting Matthew J. Stasiewicz, University of Illinois, Urbana, IL, United States.

The direct object identifier (DOI) for that additional information is: https://doi.org/10.1111/risa.13721. This DOI is a link to an online electronic document that is either free or for purchase, and can be your direct source for a journal article and its citation.

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