title: Analysis of nicotine as a trichloroethyl carbamate by gas chromatography with electron-capture detection.
abstract: Nicotine was subjected to reaction at 90 degrees with trichloroethyl chloroformate in the presence of pyridine to form a carbamate in which the pyrrolidine ring was opened. Upon heat treatment, this carbamate partially formed the corresponding olefin. About 10 pg could be detected with an electron-capture detector and 60 pg with an alkali flame-ionization detector. The extraction was studied with 14C-labelled nicotine. Methylene chloride was suitable for extraction from diluted plasma, whereas toluene containing 5% of heptafluorobutanol was used in a re-extraction step and also as the chloroformate reaction medium. Due to a nicotine blank the limit for quantitative determinations was 10 ng/ml in plasma (sample volume 1 ml). N-n-Propylnornicotine was used as an internal standard. The precision at the 30 ng/ml level was +/- 8.8% (n = 7).
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D002219:Carbamates / Q000032:analysis / Q000097:blood; D002849:Chromatography, Gas; D004583:Electrons; D008722:Methods; D008832:Microchemistry; D009538:Nicotine / Q000031:analogs & derivatives / Q000032:analysis* / Q000097:blood; D013552:Swine
chemical_list: D002219:Carbamates; D009538:Nicotine