Abstract:
To compare the chemical components in e-cigarettes (Ec-3) with those in two hybrid e-cigarette products (coded as Hy-1 and Hy-2), the main components (glycerol, propylene glycol and nicotine) and tobacco-specific nitrosamines (TSNAs) were selected as analytes to analyze e-liquids, tobacco segments and aerosol samples with GC and LC-MS/MS methods. The results showed that:1) For e-liquids, glycerin and propylene glycol were used as main solvents. The Hy-1 sample was nicotine-free in its e-liquid, while the samples of Ec-3 and Hy-2 contained nicotine, and the deviation between the labeled values and the measured nicotine values was less than 10%. 2) For tobacco segments, the nicotine content in Hy-1 was significantly higher than that in Hy-2. The chemical composition of the tobacco segments differed before and after puffing, which indicated that tobacco particles of Hy-1 adsorbed partial propylene glycol and tobacco segments of Hy-2 adsorbed glycerol, propylene glycol and nicotine. 3) For aerosol, no measurable nicotine was released from Hy-1 before adding tobacco particles, while the nicotine release was closed to that from Hy-2 after adding tobacco particles. The release of nicotine from Ec-3 was significantly higher than that from the hybrid samples. 4) TSNAs were not detected in the e-liquid and aerosol of Ec-3, and were detected in the tobacco segments of Hy-1 and Hy-2, but only trace NNN was detected in their aerosols.