Determination of Catechol in Cigarette Smoke Condensate by High-Performance Liquid Chromatography (HPLC) Analysis with an Automated Precolumn Sample Preparation

A procedure has been developed for a simple and specific determination of catechol in cigarette smoke condensate. The analysis is performed by high-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) with column switching between a precolumn and an analytical column. Catechol is separated from most of the condensate components by selective adsorption on a dihydroxyboryl silica gel precolumn. It is then determined without interference on a reverse-phase (C₁₈) column. By column switching this procedure is run automatically within 15 min. The method is well suited for the routine measurement of a large number of samples, since it allows condensate solutions to be injected directly into the analysis system without prior laborious and time-consuming clean-up procedures.