A prominent source of hazardous air pollutants into indoor nonsmoking environments
Sheu R, Stonner C, Ditto JC, Klupfel T, Williams J, Gentner DR. Human transport of thirdhand tobacco smoke: A prominent source of hazardous air pollutants into indoor nonsmoking environments. Science Advances. 4 Mar 2020: Vol. 6, no. 10, eaay4109. DOI: 10.1126/sciadv.aay4109
https://advances.sciencemag.org/content/6/10/eaay4109
“The contamination of indoor nonsmoking environments with thirdhand smoke (THS) is an important, poorly understood public health concern. Real-time THS off-gassing from smokers into a nonsmoking movie theater was observed with online and offline high-resolution mass spectrometry. Prominent emission events of THS tracers (e.g., 2,5-dimethylfuran, 2-methylfuran, and acetonitrile) and other tobacco-related volatile organic compounds (VOCs) coincided with the arrival of certain moviegoers and left residual contamination. These VOC emission events exposed occupants to the equivalent of 1 to 10 cigarettes of secondhand smoke, including multiple hazardous air pollutants (e.g., benzene and formaldehyde) at parts-per-billion concentrations.”
By Stephen Hamann
