Abstract:
In order to study the releasing performance of main components in reconstituted tobacco sheets for electrically heated tobacco products, microscopic morphological analysis of reconstituted tobacco sheets from drying process, paper-making, slurry and rolling methods were performed. The main components in the aerosol generated, such as aerosol collected matters (ACM), nicotine, glycerol and moisture, were analyzed with a tube furnace heating device to investigate the effects of moisture content, mass fraction of glycerol and heating temperature. The releasing performance parameters included the total releasing amount, releasing rate, collecting ratio and puff-by-puff releasing stability of the reconstituted tobacco sheets by different processes. The results showed that: 1) The microstructures and releasing rates of different reconstituted tobacco sheets were quite different. Compared to the other reconstituted tobacco sheets, the rolling process reconstituted tobacco sheet had relatively more homogeneous and compact structure and better puff-by-puff releasing stabilities of the main components. 2) The puffing numbers corresponding to the maximum releases of nicotine and glycerin increased with increase of moisture content in reconstituted tobacco sheets, and its effects on nicotine and glycerin releases varied for different tobacco sheets. 3) Higher glycerol mass fraction in the reconstituted tobacco sheets promoted the releases of ACM, glycerol and moisture to different extents, and its effect on nicotine release varied for the different tobacco sheets. 4) The releasing rates of the main components increased with the rise of heating temperature in the range from 160 ℃ to 250 ℃, however the puff-by-puff releasing stability became worse. There was an optimum heating temperature range that could balance the releasing amounts, releasing rates and puff-by-puff releasing stabilities of the main components in the reconstituted tobacco sheets.