Ciguatera fish poisoning is a serious human health issue that is highly localized to tropical and sub-tropical coastal areas, affecting many of the indigenous island communities intrinsically linked to reef systems for sustenance and trade. It is caused by the consumption of reef fish contaminated with ciguatoxins and is reported as the most common cause of non-bacterial food poisoning. The causative toxins bioaccumulate up the food web, from small herbivorous fish that graze on microalgae of the genus Gambierdiscus into the higher trophic level omnivorous and carnivorous fish predating on them. The number of Gambierdiscus species being described is increasing rapidly and the role of other toxins produced by this microalgal genus in ciguatera intoxications, such as maitotoxin, remains unclear. Ciguatoxins and maitotoxin are among the most potent marine toxins known and there are currently no methods of analysis that can simultaneously monitor these toxins with a high degree of specificity. To meet this need a rapid and selective ultra-performance liquid chromatography tandem mass spectrometry method has been developed to rapidly screen Gambierdiscus cultures and environmental sample device extracts for ciguatoxins and maitotoxins. A fast sample preparation method has also been developed to allow sensitive quantification of the potent ciguatoxin fish metabolite P-CTX-1B from fish extracts, and this method has been subjected to a small validation study. Novel aspects of this approach include the use of alkaline mobile phase for chromatographic separation and specific monitoring of the various toxins. This method has good potential to help evaluate ciguatera risk associated with Gambierdiscus and related microalgal species, and to help promote method development activities for this important and analytically challenging toxin class.

Ciguatera鱼中毒是一个严重的人类健康问题，高度存在于热带和亚热带沿海地区，影响了许多与珊瑚礁维持和贸易有关的土著岛屿社区。它是由食用被雪茄毒素污染的珊瑚鱼引起的，据报道是非细菌性食物中毒的最常见原因。致病性毒素会在食物网中生物累积，从在甘比氏菌属微藻上吃草的小型草食性鱼类到其上的营养级别较高的杂食性和食肉性鱼类。Gambierdiscus的数量所描述的物种正在迅速增加，由这种微藻属产生的其他毒素在瓜酒中毒中的作用，如麦托毒素，尚不清楚。Ciguatoxins和maitotoxin是已知最有效的海洋毒素，目前尚无分析方法可以高度特异性地同时监测这些毒素。为了满足这一需求，已经开发了一种快速，选择性的超高效液相色谱串联质谱法来快速筛选甘比氏菌。文化和环境样品设备提取物，可提取雪茄毒素和麦托毒素。还开发了一种快速的样品前处理方法，可以对鱼提取物中有效的瓜瓜毒素鱼代谢产物P-CTX-1B进行灵敏的定量，并且对该方法进行了小规模的验证研究。这种方法的新颖方面包括使用碱性流动相进行色谱分离和各种毒素的特异性监测。该方法具有很好的潜力，可以帮助评估与冈比亚鞭毛虫和相关微藻物种有关的卡加特兰风险，并有助于促进这一重要且具有分析挑战性的毒素类别的方法开发活动。