Magnetism of cigarette ashes

Mineral composition of cigarette ashes is well studied in the literature, but no reports are available about the magnetic fraction. Our study presents an investigation of the basic magnetic characteristics of ashes from several commercially available cigarette brands and a wood ash. Magnetic susceptibility, which is a concentration-dependent parameter in case of uniform mineralogy, shows that cigarette ashes contain relatively high amount of magnetic iron minerals, similar to that in wood ash from our study and other literature data. Magnetization data suggest that cigarette ashes contain some 0.1 wt% or lower quantity of magnetite, depending on the brand. Analyses of magnetic mineralogy imply that the main magnetic minerals in ashes from higher quality cigarette brands are magnetite and iron carbide cementite, while in ashes from lower quality brands without additives magnetic minerals are pure and substituted with foreign ions magnetite. Magnetic grain-size analysis shows that cigarette ashes contain significant amount of very fine, nano-meter sized magnetic particles, as well as coarser (up to several microns), magnetically stable grains. Thus, the magnetic study of cigarette ashes proved that these plant ashes possess non-negligible magnetic properties. The results could serve for better elucidation of mineralogy of cigarette ashes as a whole, as well as for future investigation on the presence of magnetic ultra fine particles in cigarette smoke, which may be inhaled in lungs during smoking.