ABSTRACT
To measure particle size distribution of phenols in mainstream cigarette smoke aerosol,the particles of cigarette smoke aerosol were divided into 12 stages using single channel smoking machine coupled electrical low-pressure impactor (ELPI) and collected by 12 polyester films.The collected particles were weighted and then analyzed by ultra-high performance liquid chromatography-fluorescence detection (UPLC-FLD) to determine the 14 phenols in the different size particles.The results showed that the aerosols collecting method had good stability with relative standard deviation (RSD) of collected particles mass less than 10%.The analyzing results of 14 phenols by UPLC-FLD showed that the linear correlation coefficients(R2) were greater than 0.9959,with detection limits were less than 1.2 ng/cig and recoveries were 80.1%-115.0%.The distributions of 14 phenols with respect to smoke aerosol particle size were investigated.The results indicated that except 4-ethyl-2-methoxy-phenol not detected,the other 13 phenols were detected in mainstream cigarette smoke aerosol.The content of 13 phenols appeared increasing at first and then decreasing with increase of the particle size which distributed in a pattern similar to that of particle mass.All of 13 phenols were present in higher amounts in the medium size particles (0.261-0.722 μm) with peak content in particles 0.431 μm.The distribution of concentrations (ratio of content to particle mass) of 13 phenols in different size particles was different.The concentrations of phenol and mono-substituted phenol appeared to first increase and then decrease with increasing smoke aerosol particle size and were higher in medium size particles (0.261-0.772 μm).The concentrations of benzenediol and mono-substituted benzenediol were uniformly distributed in medium size particles (0.144-1.166 μm),and the concentration of disubstituted phenol was uniform throughout the particles of varying sizes.