ABSTRACT
In its 1986 monograph on tobacco smoking, the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) wrote very little about nitriles in tobacco smoke. IARC categorized HCN as one of the most toxic agents in the vapor phase of tobacco smoke and noted its presence in smoke was dependent on the level of nitrate, proteins, and amino acids in tobacco [see p. 96 in (1870)]. IARC also listed cyanogen as a tobacco smoke component. In its summary of its evaluation for carcinogenicity of chemical components identified in tobacco smoke, IARC did classify 2-propenenitrile (acrylonitrile) with sufficient evidence for carcinogenicity in animals but limited evidence in humans [see p. 392 in (1870)]. The per cigarette MSS yield of 2-propenenitrile (acrylonitrile) was listed at 3.2 to 15 μg, based on data provided by Wynder and Hoffmann from their 1982 publication (4348a). In a publication issued shortly after the IARC 1986 monograph on tobacco smoking, Hoffmann and Wynder estimated the number of tobacco smoke components to be approximately 3900, of which the number of nitriles was listed at 105 [see Table 1 in (1808)]. They listed HCN as a major toxic agent in nonfiltered cigarette smoke [see Table 2 in (1808)] and 2-propenenitrile (acrylonitrile) as a biologically active agent in MSS [see Table 13 in (1808)]. It is interesting to note that despite the considerable contribution of Wynder and Hoffmann to the subject of smoke components and their biological properties in the IARC 1986 monograph on tobacco smoking that only HCN, cyanogen, and 2-propenenitrile (acrylonitrile) of the 105 nitriles noted by Hoffmann and Wynder (1808) appeared in the IARC monograph (1870).
