United States statutory requirements under The Family Smoking Prevention and Tobacco Control Act require that the FDA establish a list of all constituents identified by the FDA as harmful or potentially harmful (HPHC), that the FDA establish regulatory requirements for testing and reporting of smoke constituents by brand and sub-brand, and that the FDA publish the list of HPHC in tobacco products in a format that is understandable to a lay person.

It has been demonstrated through collaborative studies that testing of single batch reference products with standardized methods may have a spread in mainstream smoke yields of approximately 20% for ‘tar’, nicotine, and carbon monoxide and greater than 50% for water when comparing results from different laboratories^[1].

In anticipation of possible regulatory reporting for commercial products, what spread in data might be expected in results for multiple batches of production cigarettes tested over time with standardized and non-standardized methods was of interest in our work.

With this in mind, an investigation was undertaken to characterize mean smoke and filler HPHC yields for selected products. Also of interest was the determination of relative differences in yield between ISO and intense smoking regimes and the determination of relative variability in yield between repeated testing of single batches of cigarettes versus testing of multiple batches for a given set of cigarettes.

Cigarettes with a range of construction variables and ‘tar’ yields were tested. Results presented will include mean, temporal variability, and batch to batch variability comparisons within and across products.

[1] Collaborative Study of CORESTA Monitor #6 (CM6) for the Determination of Test Piece Weight, TPM, Water, Nicotine, NFDPM, Carbon Monoxide and Puff Count Obtained Under Mainstream “ISO” and “Intense” Smoking Regimes, 2010