Smokers are known to have elevated levels of lipid peroxidation, a form of oxidative stress.Etheno DNA adduct formation can originate from endogenous lipid peroxidation or fromexogenous exposure of carcinogens. Using a modified stable isotope dilution GC/negative ionchemical ionization/MS assay originally developed for urinary 3,
N4-ethenocytosine (
Cyt), thenucleoside 3,
N4-etheno-2'-deoxycytidine (
dCyd) was detected for the first time in human urine.The presence of
dCyd in human urine was confirmed by LC/electrospray ionization/tandemMS. Concentrations of
dCyd in the 24 h urine samples from healthy individuals notoccupationally exposed to industrial chemicals were in the range between 0 and 0.80 nM. Astatistically significant correlation was established between cigarette smoking and urinaryexcretion of
dCyd after being adjusted for creatinine (
p = 0.004). Furthermore, the urinarytotal antioxidant capacity was found to correlate inversely with the
dCyd levels (
r = -0.50,
p = 0.02). The results indicate that urinary
dCyd may provide a valuable noninvasivebiomarker for oxidative DNA damage.