Glycerin and propylene glycol are the main components of the atomizing agent in heat-not-burn tobacco products (HnB), which affect the smoke release of HnB significantly. In this study, the roles of the glycerin and propylene glycol as the atomizing agent on smoke release of HnB were studied by using a fixed-bed reactor system. The effects of glycerin to propylene glycol ratio in the atomizing agent, and the content of atomizing agent in the HnB were investigated. Gas chromatography-mass spectrometer (GC-MS) was used to analyze the condensable components in the released smoke, and gas chromatography (GC) was used to analyze the gaseous products. The results showed that glycerol could promote the thermal cracking of tobacco and smoke release during pyrolysis. The amount of smoke was the largest when the glycerol ratio was 60%, meanwhile the nicotine content in the smoke was also the highest. When using the glycerin and propylene glycol mixture as the atomizing agent, the amount of smoke and concentration of nicotine and CO in the smoke were increased when the content of atomizing agent decreased in the HnB. The results indicated that the interactions between glycerin and propylene glycol, and the interactions between the atomizing agent and the tobacco were both existed during smoking, which could change the characteristics of the atomizing agent and the smoke release property of HnB.
In order to clarify the reasons for the good smoke release characteristics of IQOS, the factors that are beneficial to the smoke release characteristics of IQOS were studied by comparing the K (the amount of released smoke was less) and IQOS. The components of IQOS and K which were easy to be released were characterized by the GC-MS. The thermal release characteristics of IQOS, K and the original tobacco powders of K were characterized by the thermogravimetric analyzer (TG). The main compounds of the released smoke of IQOS and K were characterized by Py/GC-MS at two typical heating temperatures (260 and 330°C). The results show that: 1) the actual heating temperature of the IQOS was higher (330°C), which could promote the release of smoke. 2) IQOS tobacco stick has a porous structure with higher specific surface area, which was beneficial to the release of smoke. 3) IQOS contains more components which were easy to be released, thus the high concentration of smoke could be formed. 4) Though the content of the atomization agent in IQOS was lower than that in K, more atomization agent in IQOS could be released at the tobacco cracking temperature (330°C), thus the atomization property of IQOS was better.
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