"nitrous acid" is a chemical compound made up of nitrous oxide and water. It is a type of acid that can be used in certain chemical reactions or as an ingredient in other products.
Full definition
Secondhand smoke itself contains TSNAs, but the presence
of nitrous acid in
Destaillats's team reckon that NNK is produced when nicotine from tobacco smoke reacts
with nitrous acid in the air.
Secondhand smoke itself contains TSNAs, but the presence of
nitrous acid in an environment can increase their numbers by several times in the hours after smoking has ceased.
The Berkeley Lab team has done previous studies establishing the formation of harmful thirdhand smoke constituents by reaction of nicotine with
indoor nitrous acid, showing that nicotine can react with ozone to form potentially harmful ultrafine particles, and finding that thirdhand smoke can cause genetic damage in human cells.
Induced conversion of nitrogen dioxide
into nitrous acid on submicron humic acid aerosol.
Tsai C., M. Spolaor, S. F. Colosimo, O. Pikelnaya, R. Cheung, E. Williams, J. B. Gilman, B. M. Lerner, R. J. Zamora, et al. (February 2018):
Nitrous acid formation in a snow - free wintertime polluted rural area.
Instead the leftover nicotine can react with
nitrous acid vapor, an environmentally common chemical emitted from gas appliances and vehicles, among other sources.
Our study shows that when this residual nicotine reacts with
ambient nitrous acid it forms carcinogenic tobacco - specific nitrosamines or TSNAs,» says Hugo Destaillats, a chemist with the Indoor Environment Department of Berkeley Lab's Environmental Energy Technologies Division.
Furthermore, there is a risk that these materials will result in the production of other undesirable species such
as nitrous acid and formaldehyde, which can have wider impacts on atmospheric chemistry as well as adverse health impacts.
Aerosol chemist Markus Ammann of the Paul Scherrer Institute in Villigen, Switzerland, and his colleagues, suspected that soot particles — spewed when fossil fuels are burned — might have a hand in
creating nitrous acid.
«What we see in this study is that the reactions of residual nicotine with
nitrous acid at surface interfaces are a potential cancer hazard, and these results may be just the tip of the iceberg.»
Humic acid in ice: Photo - enhanced conversion of nitrogen dioxide
into nitrous acid.
Mohamad Sleiman was the lead author of a paper titled «Formation of carcinogens indoors by surface - mediated reactions of nicotine
with nitrous acid, leading to potential third - hand smoke hazards.»
Simultaneous measurements of formaldehyde and
nitrous acid in dews and gas phase in the atmosphere of Santiago, Chile.
To test the theory, the team deposited either nicotine or tobacco smoke on sheets of paper, and exposed them to
nitrous acid.
These are produced when nicotine deposits on indoor surfaces and then is released again to the gas phase or reacts with ozone,
nitrous acid and other atmospheric oxidants.
Nitrous acid, for example, has long been blamed for instigating a chain of reactions that leads to smog.
To find out, they burned gasoline and let the soot react with nitrogen dioxide, a by - product of hydrocarbon fuel combustion and the precursor of
nitrous acid.
The source of
nitrous acid, however, remained unknown.
When nicotine in thirdhand smoke reacts with
nitrous acid it undergoes a chemical transformation and forms carcinogenic tobacco - specific nitrosamines, such as NNA, NNK and NNN.
The 2010 studies from Berkeley Lab found that residual nicotine can react with ozone and
nitrous acid — both common indoor air pollutants — to form hazardous agents.
The authors report that in laboratory tests using cellulose as a model indoor material exposed to smoke, levels of newly formed TSNAs detected on cellulose surfaces were 10 times higher than those originally present in the sample following exposure for three hours to a «high but reasonable» concentration of
nitrous acid (60 parts per billion by volume).
Since most vehicle engines emit
some nitrous acid that can infiltrate the passenger compartments, tests were also conducted on surfaces inside the truck of a heavy smoker, including the surface of a stainless steel glove compartment.