Trifluralin Screening in Shrimp Farming

Trifluralin has been used in agriculture since 1963 and is a selective pre-emergence dinitroanaline herbicide which is used to control grasses and broad leaf weeds in various tree fruit, nut, vegetable and grain crops. Trifluralin can persist in the environment for a long period of time and is highly toxic to aquatic animals. Trifluralin can bioaccumulate therefore sediment-feeding organisms are most at risk. Studies carried out on the genotoxic potential of trifluralin conclude that it is non-genotoxic and evidence suggests that trifluralin does not pose a carcinogenic risk to humans.

The World Health Organisation has classified trifluralin as unlikely to present acute hazard in normal use. Japan however has previously applied a new regulation of inspecting 30% of the shrimp imported from Vietnam for trifluralin residues. Japan has also warned Vietnam that if trifluralin was detected in a batch of shrimp, Japan would immediately apply the 100 percent inspection regulation.

In order to satisfy this screening requirement for exporting shrimps, Randox Food Diagnostics have developed a Trifluralin ELISA. Excellent limits of detections of 0.17ppb can be achieved using a simple sample preparation. 40 samples can be prepared in less than 3 hours and assay time to results is 90mins. Many of the required reagents including spiking material are provided in the kit reducing the cost to the end user.