Determination of cadmium in tobacco smoke by electrothermal atomic absorption spectroscopy with electrostatic precipitation of samples on the graphite tube atomizer

Abstract

The determination of Cd in ambient air, associated with tobacco smoke, has been carried out by electrostatic precipitation of Cd directly in a graphite tube, which was subsequently used as an atomizer in electrothermal atomization atomic absorption spectroscopy (ET-AAS). It is shown that graphite tube permanently modified with Ir allows carrying out pyrolysis of collected samples at 1000°C, leading to minimization of the blank. The combination of electrostatic precipitation of Cd from ambient air into the graphite tube with high efficiency of Cd determination by ET-AAS allows to trace Cd in ambient air for 25 min after the smoking a cigarette The limit of detection (LOD) of Cd determination was found to be 0.2 ng/m 3 . The results of investigations confirm the danger of passive smoking due to the presence of Cd in smoking areas.