Fontem Ventures investigates indoor ecig vapor properties

A study co-authored by Fontem Ventures finds that e-cigarette aerosols are made of droplets of liquid that disappear within a few seconds after emission.

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April 22, 2016

Workplace and Indoor Aerosols conference, Barcelona (Spain)

On April 20, a poster entitled “Aerosol concentration variations in a room during use of an e-cigarette” was presented at the 4th Workplace and Indoor Aerosols conference in Barcelona by Dainius Martuzevicius, Associate Professor at Haunas University of Technology (Lithuania).

A research consortium leaded by Fontem Ventures

In addition to Fontem Venture and SEITA-Imperial Brands, the consortium also combines expertises from:

Kaunas University of Technology (Lithuania),
EMPA, Swiss Federal Laboratories for Materials Science and Technology,
ETH, Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (Zurich).

Positive implication for continued use of e-cigarettes indoors

The authors argue that the study may have a positive implication for continued use of e-cigarettes in indoor areas because it shows “for the first time exhaled e-cigarette particles are liquid droplets that evaporate rapidly upon exhalation”.

113629_rel — This graph shows the decay of aerosol concentration at a bystander’s inhalation point after exhalation of an e-cigarette puff at various distances

Their results indicate that the concentration of particles may reach several millions of particles per cubic centimetres in the room where the experiment is carried out but the concentration also decreases very quickly, within a few seconds, to return to background level. The concentration decreases as a function of the distance between the emitter and the analytical sampler and no accumulation of particles was registered in the room during 30 min period after e-cigarette use.

The authors believe that “fast return to background concentrations also indicates that the majority of exhaled particles were in the liquid state and evaporated almost immediately upon exhalation”.

“This study shows that e-cigarettes – similar to other consumer aerosol-based products – release liquid primary particles into the air that disappear extremely quickly” – G. O’Connell

The co-author and Vice President of Fontem Ventures Corporate and Regulatory Affairs, Grant O’Connell, emphasized “this also tells us how fundamentally different exhaled e-cigarette particles are compared to those emitted by smoking conventional cigarettes, the latter of which are reported to linger in the air for long periods of time. By contrast, no accumulation of particles was registered in the room following e-cigarette use.”

Fontem Ventures, a branch of Imperial Tobacco Group PLC, renamed Imperial Brands, and the owner of the e-cigarette Blu, recently announced that it has developed a partnership with the Austrian company IONICON Analytik GmbH for the analysis of volatile organic compounds (VOCs) present in e-cigarettes aerosols. ETH is a European leader in the analysis of e-cigarette vapor based on Secondary ElectroSpray Ionization (SESI).