Safety evaluation of pigment containing Aspergillus carbonarius biomass in albino rats

Aspergillus carbonarius, an ascomycetes fungus, is known to produce pectinase in solid-state fermentation. A mutant strain of A. carbonarius UV-10046 selected for temperature tolerance over produced polygalacturonase and during growth accumulated an yellow pigment in its biomass. Since the colored fungus suggested its application for food use, the freeze-dried biomass was evaluated to assess its safety in experimental animals. Acute and sub-acute toxicity studies were conducted on both sexes of albino rats. Feeding acute doses of A. carbonarius freeze-dried biomass at 0.5–5.0 g/kg body weight to adult rats did not show any symptoms of toxicity or mortality of the rats. Similarly, dietary feeding of A. carbonarius at 0.25–2.0% level (w/w) for 14 weeks did not produce any significant changes in food intake or gain in body weight of the experimental rats compared to control rats. There were no significant differences in the relative weight of vital organs, hematological parameters, macroscopic and microscopic changes in vital organs and serum enzyme levels between the experimental and control groups. The results clearly showed that acute and sub-acute oral feeding of freeze-dried whole cells of A. carbonarius mutant for 14 weeks did not produce any toxic effects in male and female rats.