Abstract
Tobacco-free electronic cigarettes (e-cigarettes), which are currently not regulated by the FDA, have become widespread as a "safe" form of smoking. One approach to evaluate the potential toxicity of e-cigarettes and other types of potentially "reduced-harm" cigarettes is to compare their emissions of volatile organic compounds (VOCs), including reactive organic electrophillic compounds such as acrolein, and particulate matter to those of conventional and reference cigarettes. Our newly designed fast-flow tube system enabled us to analyze VOC composition and particle number concentration in real-time by promptly diluting puffs of mainstream smoke obtained from different brands of combustion cigarettes and e-cigarettes. A proton transfer reaction time-of-flight mass spectrometer (PTRMS) was used to analyze real-time cigarette VOC emissions with a 1 s time resolution. Particles were detected with a condensation particle counter (CPC). This technique offers real-time analysis of VOCs and particles in each puff without sample aging and does not require any sample pretreatment or extra handling. Several important determining factors in VOC and particle concentration were investigated: (1) puff frequency; (2) puff number; (3) tar content; (4) filter type. Results indicate that electronic cigarettes are not free from acrolein and acetaldehyde emissions and produce comparable particle number concentrations to those of combustion cigarettes, more specifically to the 1R5F reference cigarette. Unlike conventional cigarettes, which emit different amounts of particles and VOCs each puff, there was no significant puff dependence in the e-cigarette emissions. Charcoal filter cigarettes did not fully prevent the emission of acrolein and other VOCs.
Highlights
Mainstream smoke of conventional cigarettes has been well studied (Piade et al 2013) and characterized over the past several decades
Ingebrethsen et al (2012) found particle diameters with an electrical mobility analyzer of 2 s puffs of two cartomizer electronic cigarettes to be of diameters 14 nm and 21 nm, but the same samples characterized with a spectral extinction approach were found to have diameters of 300 nm and 240 nm, respectively
The e-cigarette-1 particles of this study that were diluted by a factor of 103 and measured with the scanning mobility particle sizer (SMPS) instrument had similar particle size diameters as the e-cigarette particles in the study by Ingebrethsen et al (2012) that relied on an electrical mobility analyzer and diluted the puffs by a factor of 103
Summary
Mainstream smoke of conventional cigarettes has been well studied (Piade et al 2013) and characterized over the past several decades. Since the first Surgeon General report in 1964, conventional cigarettes have been modified in several different ways to design potentially “reduced-harm cigarettes”, in efforts to lessen the harmful health effects (Pankow et al 2007). Its design differs greatly from any previous cigarette in that it does not contain tobacco; puffing on the device leads to volatilization of nicotine at elevated temperatures but in the absence of any combustion. This mode of cigarette use is often referred to as “vaping” instead of “smoking”. A recent review by Chapman and Wu (2014) found that in 2011, adolescents aged 11–19 in grades 6– 12 attributed to up to 3.3% of e-cigarette ever-use (meaning tried at least once) in the U.S, and their number increased to 6.8% in 2012
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