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Study on the effect of potassium lactate additive on the combustion behavior and mainstream smoke of cigarettes

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Abstract

The influence of potassium lactate (PL) on the combustion behavior and semi-volatile compounds of tobacco during smoking is investigated in this study. The addition of PL showed no effect on the content of total particulate matter, nicotine-free dry particulate matter, puff number, and nicotine. Meanwhile, a 22.5 % increase in moisture content and 3 % decrease in CO content of mainstream smoke were observed when the added amount of PL was up to 2 %. The differential thermogravimetric curves indicated that PL decreased the maximum combustion rate and influenced the thermal degradation stage of tobacco by shifting the peak point of temperature to a higher value. The gas evolution profiles obtained from Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy during combustion showed that PL could lower the CO and CO2 yield, but did not affect the generation of CH4 and carbonyl compounds. A great variation in semi-volatile components of the mainstream smoke was also observed from the tobacco containing PL compared with the control. The comprehensive two-dimensional gas chromatography coupled to time-of-flight mass spectrometry analysis showed that PL increased the yield of alcohols, lactons, miscellaneous oxygenated compounds and amides, but decreased that of aldehydes, acids, pyrroles and pyrazines. A small added amount (0.2 %) of PL reduced the content of total semi-volatile substances, ketones, esters, phenols, hydrocarbons, pyridines, tobacco alkaloids, and nitrogenous compound. However, the contents of these substances were not affected when the added amount was >0.2 %. PL bound the ash during combustion, thereby leading to the change of combustion behavior and certain smoke components.

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Acknowledgements

This work was supported by the Scientific Foundation of China National Tobacco Corporation (No. 110200901002). The authors would also like to thank R&D Center of China Tobacco Anhui Industrial Corporation.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. State Key Laboratory of Food Science and Technology, School of Food Science and Technology, Jiangnan University, Wuxi, 214122, Jiangsu, People’s Republic of China

    Chunyan Yin, Yue Li, Weifeng Sun, Zhilei Zhou, Maoshen Chen & Fang Zhong

  2. Research and Development Centre, China Tobacco Anhui Industrial Corporation, 9 Tianda Road, Hefei, 230088, Anhui, People’s Republic of China

    Zhiqiang Xu, Junsheng Shu & Hua Wang

Authors
  1. Chunyan Yin
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  2. Zhiqiang Xu
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  3. Junsheng Shu
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  4. Hua Wang
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  5. Yue Li
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  7. Zhilei Zhou
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  9. Fang Zhong
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Correspondence to Fang Zhong.

Appendix 1

Appendix 1

See Table 3.

Table 3 Semi-volatile compounds identified in mainstream smoke using GC×GC-TOF-MS
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Yin, C., Xu, Z., Shu, J. et al. Study on the effect of potassium lactate additive on the combustion behavior and mainstream smoke of cigarettes. J Therm Anal Calorim 115, 1733–1751 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10973-013-3478-4

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