Determination of rutin in cigarette tobacco, filters, mainstream smoke and burned ash of different branded cigarettes by high performance liquid chromatography.

Tobacco consists of at least 3,800 chemical constituents. Among them, rutin is an important polyphenolic secondary metabolite in tobacco, which has positive actions such as antiallergic, anti-inflammatory and vasoactive, antitumor, antibacterial, antiviral and anti-protozoal properties. A high performance liquid chromatography method was used to analyze rutin in tobacco and filters, mainstream smoke, and burned ash of ten varieties of cigarettes made in China. The chromatographic analysis was performed on a Hypersil ODS2 column with a gradient elution of acetonitrile and water at a flow rate of 1.0 mL/min. Detection was carried out at 350 nm using a photodiode array detector. The calibration curves for the determination of analytes showed good linearity over the investigated ranges (R2 > 0.9998). Precision and reproducibility were evaluated by six replicated analyses, and the R.S.D. values were less than 0.59% and 1.53%. The recoveries were between 98.47 and 100.84%. Under the optimized conditions, namely 45 mL/g of solvent to solid ratio, 30 min of extraction time and 200 W of ultrasound power, the concentrations of rutin in tobacco and filter, mainstream smoke, burned ash of different brands cigarettes were 10.20-63.98, 0.10-0.32, 0.06-0.16 and 0 μg/per cigarette, respectively.