Reducing DON content in distillers dried grains and solubles

Dr. John Barnard, Acsion Industries, explains how an electron accelerator works

Technology used to sterilize medical equipment is being studied to help add value in ethanol production. Acsion Industries, located at Whiteshell Laboratories in Pinawa, recently took fusarium-infected samples of distillers dried grains and solubles (DDGS) from Husky Energy's plant in Minnedosa and treated them with an electron beam. Encouraging results showed that electron beam treatment can reduce concentrations of deoxynivalenol (DON), the major mycotoxin in fusarium, by up to 75 per cent compared to non-radiated samples. Acsion Industries received a $14,000 ARDI grant to complete this work.

Electron beam processing involves spraying a stream of high-energy electrons produced by an accelerator (pictured above) onto a product. The treatment can control pathogens in food, sterilize bandages and medical devices and also cure composites for the aerospace industry. "It's efficacious, reliable and cost-effective technology," says Dr. John Barnard, Director of Research and Technology at Acsion.

Acsion's Senior Chemist, Terry Stepanik, set out to discover whether the technology could add value to ethanol production by increasing the marketability of DDGS, a byproduct from ethanol production that is sold for animal feed. Because DON is stable during ethanol production, fusarium-infected wheat or corn produces a DDGS byproduct infected with the mycotoxin, potentially eliminating the possibility of marketing the product as animal feed. Tests carried out at the Canadian Grain Commission showed that the electron beam treatment completed in the Acsion Industries laboratories significantly reduced DON levels in DDGS. "The key," says Dr. Stepanik, "is to treat the byproducts when they are wet, before the final drying process." In an industrial setting, the combination of electron beam treatment and drying could potentially reduce the final DON levels in DDGS by 90 per cent or more.

Further work is now required to determine what effects (if any) electron beam irradiation has on the nutritional quality of DDGS. Readers wanting a fuller exploration of this project can read "Fusarium toxins come under fire" in the Jan. 18 issue of the Western Producer.

South Tobacco Creek watershed work continues

The Steppler Reservoir has been monitored for inflow and outflow since the 1990s.

What happens when an ARDI project wraps up? You never can tell where research will lead, so this month we checked in with the lead researcher for ARDI project 99.333. ARDI awarded a $36,000 grant in April 2000 to the Deerwood Soil and Water Management Association, led by Bill Turner, to investigate the effect of small dam headwater storage in the South Tobacco Creek watershed.

The South Tobacco Creek watershed is near Miami, Manitoba, about 150 kms southwest of Winnipeg on the Manitoba Escarpment. Most of the land in the watershed is used for agricultural production, including cereal crops, oilseeeds, forages and livestock. Water from this area drains through South Tobacco Creek, Tobacco Creek and the Morris River into the Red River. Before a series of 26 small dams were built throughout the watershed in the 1980s, high water yields from the area repeatedly caused significant flooding, erosion and damage to roads, culverts and bridges.

The three year ARDI-funded study revolved around several of these small dams, or reservoirs, including the Steppler Reservoir shown above. The dams have been effective in reducing rapid runoff from the Manitoba Escarpment during spring melts and summer rains, but the ARDI study concentrated on whether the dams are effective in sequestering nitrogen, phosphorus and sediment runoff -- preventing the nutrients from travelling downstream. Excess nutrients such as phosphorus have been of major concern in Lake Winnipeg, causing algae blooms and potentially fish kills.

After three years of collecting water samples, and monitoring the inflow and outflow of water from these dams, the project concluded that these small dams result in a significant reduction in downstream nutrient loading from runoff water, adding to the overall economic benefit of building them.

Now, the work continues on a broader scale, as part of Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada's Watershed Evaluation of beneficial management practices, a national project dubbed WEBs. Five watershed management practices are being assessed within the Steppler-South Tobacco Creek watershed, including collecting additional data comparing the runoff and nutrients entering and exiting the small dams. "That early ARDI money for this project has been key to the whole four-year study, providing background historical water quality data," said Bill Turner, as the WEBs project moves into its fourth and final year.

For more information on the WEBs project, see www.agr.gc.ca/env/greencover-verdir.