Nicotine Determination in Commercial Grade Cigarettes via HPLC ('03)

Tony Tong and Spencer H. Porter

The amount of information regarding nicotine content in cigarettes is slight, and few studies have been done to bring light to this subject.  Through HPLC nicotine was identified and quantified in three commercially available tobacco products.  With our methodology, we obtained the following values of nicotine in tobacco:  12.7+/0.6 mg/g in Camel cigarettes, 11.7+/-0.5 mg/g in Merit Light , and 20.6+/-0.7 mg/g in American Spirit organic tobacco.  This indicates that although branded as organic , organic tobacco is not an alternative to cigarettes; in fact, it can be even more addictive.