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[Detecting nicotine and its metabolite cotinine in human hair with capillary gas chromatography]
Su-ying Gu1, Yuan-qian Li, Chi-qing Liu
1Sanitary Technology, West China School of Public Health, Sichuan University, Chengdu 610041, China.
Objective:
To develop a rapid method for determination of nicotine and its metabolite cotinine in human hair with capillary gas chromatography with flame ionization detector.
Methods:
The hair sample was digested by 1.5 mol/L sodium hydroxide solution. The nicotine and cotinine in the hair sample were extracted with a mixed solvent of dichloromethane-methanol (3:1). Aliquot of the extraction solution was vaporized with nitrogen flow and then methanol was added to dissolve the analysts. The analysts were tested with capillary gas chromatography.
Results:
The detection limits (signal to noise ratio of 3:1) were 4.3 ng/mL for nicotine and 10 ng/mL for cotinine, respectively. The spiked recoveries were 90.33%-113.1% for nicotine with relative standard deviation (RSD) of 2.1%-7.0% and 92.92%-117.4% for cotinine with relative standard deviation (RSD) of 4.4%-8.9%, respectively.
Conclusion:
The proposed method is sensitive, simple, easy and rapid. It can be easily extended to large scale applications in tobacco epidemiology studies.
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