Tar and Nicotine in Cigarette Smoke

Cigarettes were conditioned 24 hr at 75°F and 60% relative humidity prior to being selected and smoked in a random order. Cigarettes were smoked in a Cambridge filter holder on an automatic smoking machine to a pre-determined butt length. TPM wet collection was on a CM113A filter disk and was determined as the net weight gain in the Cambridge filter holder after smoking. The filter pads were extracted with dioxane-isopropanol solution and were analyzed for moisture by gas chromatography. The pads and solvent extracts were steam distilled and the distillate was analyzed spectrophotometrically for nicotine. TPM dry was calculated as TPM wet minus nicotine and water. The coefficient of variation in this method is less than 5% with a 95% confidence level.