Abstract
A quantitative determination method for α- and β-thujone in cosmetics, soaps, room freshners and alcoholic beverages was developed, which consists of three steps, i.e., distillation by Dean-Stark apparatus, purfication by alumnia column chromatography, and detction by gas chromatography (GC). Samples, first diluted with water, were distilled, and both thujones were collected by cyclohexane. After the cyclohexane layer was washed with water, both thujones in it were determined by GC.
As in eaux de Cologne and room fresheners the cychrohexane layer included various kinds of substances which disturbed the analysis, alumina column chromatography was applied for purification. Both kinds of thujone were eluted by hexane-ethyl acetate (9:1) mixture from the column, which was washed with hexane, and determined by GC.
According to this method, the recovery rates ofα- and β-thujone from alcoholic beverages and hair tonics, to which 100ppm of both kinds of thujone were added, were above 90.7 and 92.4%, respectively, whereas those from soaps, eaux de Cologne and room freshners, which likewise added, were above 82.5 and 86.5%, respectively. The investigations on 38 kinds of samples in 8 categories of cosmetic, soaps, room fresheners, and alcoholic beverages in the market revealed that 45.9 amd 96.1ppm of α- and β-thujone, respectively, were detected from one brand of eau de Cologne and 238.7ppm of β-thujone from one article of room freshner. No other samples containd any of thujones.
