*2.3. Screening Lactobacillus Strains for Mycotoxin Binding Capacities*

For screening AFB1 and ST binding abilities of lactobacilli, 80 strains from our collection were selected. A phylogenetic tree was prepared with all known *Lactobacillus* strains by 16S rDNA sequences. In the case of larger clades, where our strain collection was missing the species, those missing strains were obtained from the BCCM strain collection (see Section 4.1). With these 25 strains ordered from the BCCM, a comprehensive study was conducted on the mycotoxin binding abilities of lactic acid bacteria, with emphasis on the genus *Lactobacillus*.

The mycotoxin binding experiments were performed according to the method described in Section 4.5. The cell concentration of the lactobacilli during the test was set to 10<sup>8</sup> cfu/mL based on the findings in Section 2.2.1. The incubation time with the mycotoxins was 10 min based on our results presented in Section 2.2.2.
