Wednesday, March 13, 2013

Get to Know About Sodium Hydrosulfite

In the field of organic chemistry, Sodium Hydrosulfite is recognized as a highly useful reducing agent which is used in a number of chemical reactions. At the same time, the compound is also popular as a useful chemical for a number of industrial processes as well.
Only a few chemical compounds in the field of organic chemistry can match with the Sodium Hydrosulfite when it comes to industrial applications. The fact that it is a highly versatile compound, playing a number of roles in various industrial processes, has made it one of the most popular chemicals around at present times. Sodium hydrosulfite (also known as sodium dithionite) is a white crystalline powder with a weak sulfurous odor. It is a sodium salt of dithionous acid. Although it is stable under most conditions, it will decompose in hot water and in acid solutions.
Sodium hydrosulfite is an important auxiliary agent in textile industry, paper industry, dye and gasoline:
  1. It is widely used in textile industry for vat dyeing, reduction cleaning, printing and stripping, textile bleaching.
  2. It is also used in bleaching paper pulps, especially mechanical pulps.
  3. It is used in bleaching kaolin clay, fur bleaching and reductive whitening, bleaching of bamboo products and straw products.
  4. It is used in mineral, the compound of thiourea and other sulphides. 
  5. It is used as reducing agent in chemical industry.
  6. Sodium hydrosulfite food additive grade is used in foodstuffs, as bleaching agent and preservative dried fruits, dried vegetable, vermicelli, glucose, sugar, rock sugar, caramel, candy, liquid glucose, bamboo shoots, mushrooms and canned mushrooms.
Because of its water soluble nature is one of the preferred chemicals to be used in fabric dying industries, where if any water insoluble dye, if used, can be reduced to a water-soluble alkali metal salt. The reducing nature also makes it a useful compound to be used in processes like water cleaning, gas purification to name a few.
Sodium dithionite is a powerful, inexpensive, safe and readily available reducing agent. It has been used for more than 70 years in the reduction of aromatic nitro compounds, diazonium salts, a variety of pyridinium compounds, some complex oximes and other nitrogen-containing functional groups.
The best thing about the chemical is the fact that it has a very low toxicity range, and hence is not harmful as compared to other chemicals that are used for similar purposes making Sodium Hydrosulfite such a useful and versatile compound. Read more...




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