In this study, the effects of widely used oxidizers (chlorine, hydrogen peroxide, and ozone) on the reduction of mancozeb residues on tomatoes were investigated. Mature tomato samples grown in a greenhouse were treated with mancozeb and collected at different time intervals. | Turkish Journal of Agriculture and Forestry Research Article Turk J Agric For (2014) 38: 371-376 © TÜBİTAK doi: Effects of chlorine, hydrogen peroxide, and ozone on the reduction of mancozeb residues on tomatoes Mehmet Fatih CENGİZ*, Muharrem CERTEL Department of Food Engineering, Faculty of Engineering, Akdeniz University, Antalya, Turkey Received: Accepted: Published Online: Printed: Abstract: In this study, the effects of widely used oxidizers (chlorine, hydrogen peroxide, and ozone) on the reduction of mancozeb residues on tomatoes were investigated. Mature tomato samples grown in a greenhouse were treated with mancozeb and collected at different time intervals. Mancozeb residue levels in the samples were determined for each interval using a gas chromatographymass spectrometry method. A group of the samples with a residue level of approximately 3 mg kg–1 was selected for dipping solutions experiments. Selected samples were dipped into the chlorine (10 and 100 mg L–1), hydrogen peroxide (10 and 100 mg L–1), and ozone (1 and 3 mg L–1) solutions for 5, 10, 15, and 20 min. After each experiment, the residues on the samples were analyzed and percent reductions were calculated. The reductions in residual mancozeb were significantly (P 5000 mg kg–1 ( en/). The toxicity of mancozeb and other metal EBDCs has been attributed to mainly ethylene thiourea (ETU), the major metabolite of mancozeb (Srivastava et al., 2012). ETU is known to have carcinogenic, teratogenic, and goitrogenic effects in rodents (WHO, 1988). Food processing is the major pathway by which exposure to ETU occurs. In particular, thermal treatments are associated with the higher conversion factors of EBDCs to ETU (Knio et al., 2000; Kontou et al., 2004; Kaushik et al., 2009; Certel et al., 2012). Tomato is frequently subjected to thermal treatments such
