Spectrophotometric determination of nicotine

A simple spectrophotometric method has been described for the determination of nicotine. The method is based on the reaction of nicotine with potassium permanganate in the presence of sodium hydroxide to form a water-soluble green product which shows maximum absorbance at 610 nm. Beer's law is obeyed over the concentration range 0.1-7.5 mu g ml(-1) nicotine. The relative standard deviation is 2.2% for 10 replicates of 5 mu g ml(-1) and the 3 sigma limit of detection is 0.08 mu g ml(-1) nicotine. The analytical parameters were optimized and the method was applied to the determination of nicotine in cigarettes. (C) 1999 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.