Sodium dithionite, reduction reactions

Uses. The dominant use of sulfur dioxide is as a captive intermediate for production of sulfuric acid. There is also substantial captive production in the pulp and paper industry for sulfite pulping, and it is used as an intermediate for on-site production of bleaches, eg, chlorine dioxide or sodium hydrosulfite (see Bleaching agents). There is a substantial merchant market for sulfur dioxide in the paper and pulp industry. Sulfur dioxide is used for the production of chlorine dioxide at the paper (qv) mill site by reduction of sodium chlorate in sulfuric acid solution and also for production of sodium dithionite by the reaction of sodium borohydride with sulfur dioxide (315). This last appHcation was growing rapidly in North America as of the late 1990s. 

Dithionites. Although the free-dithionous acid, H2S2O4, has never been isolated, the salts of the acid, in particular zinc [7779-86-4] and sodium dithionite [7775-14-6] have been prepared and are widely used as industrial reducing agents. The dithionite salts can be prepared by the reaction of sodium formate with sodium hydroxide and sulfur dioxide or by the reduction of sulfites, bisulfites, and sulfur dioxide with metallic substances such as zinc, iron, or zinc or sodium amalgams, or by electrolytic reduction (147). 

In the benzene and naphthalene series there are few examples of quinone reductions other than that of hydroquinone itself. There are, however, many intermediate reaction sequences in the anthraquinone series that depend on the generation, usually by employing aqueous "hydros" (sodium dithionite) of the so-called leuco compound. The reaction with leuco quinizarin [122308-59-2] is shown because this provides the key route to the important 1,4-diaminoanthtaquinones. 

Catalytic reduction of folic acid to 5,6,7,8-tetrahydrofolic acid (225) proceeds fast in trifluoroacetic acid (66HCA875), but a modified method using chemical reductants leads with sodium dithionite to 7,8-dihydrofolic acid (224). Further treatment with sodium borohydride gives (225) which has been converted into 5-formyl-(6i ,S)-5,6,7,8-tetrahydro-L-folic acid (leucovorin) (226) by reaction with methyl formate (equation 70) (80HCA2554). 

The Zincke reaction has also been adapted for the solid phase. Dupas et al. prepared NADH-model precursors 58, immobilized on silica, by reaction of bound amino functions 57 with Zincke salt 8 (Scheme 8.4.19) for subsequent reduction to the 1,4-dihydropyridines with sodium dithionite. Earlier, Ise and co-workers utilized the Zincke reaction to prepare catalytic polyelectrolytes, starting from poly(4-vinylpyridine). Formation of Zincke salts at pyridine positions within the polymer was achieved by reaction with 2,4-dinitrochlorobenzene, and these sites were then functionalized with various amines. The resulting polymers showed catalytic activity in ester hydrolysis. ... 

Reduction by sodium dithionite. A small amount of sodium dithionite, solid or in solution, is added to a luciferase solution made with 50 mM phosphate, pH 7.0, containing 50 pM FMN. The amount of dithionite used should be minimal but sufficient to remove oxygen in the solution and to fully reduce the flavin. The solution made is injected into an air-equilibrated buffer solution containing a long-chain aldehyde and luciferase to initiate the luminescence reaction. With this method, the reaction mixture will be contaminated by bisulfite and bisulfate ions derived from dithionite. 

The mechanism of the first half-reaction has been studied by a combination of reductive titrations with CO and sodium dithionite and pre-steady-state kinetic studies by rapid freeze quench EPR spectroscopy (FQ-EPR) and stopped-flow kinetics 159). These combined studies have led to the following mechanism. The resting enzyme is assumed to have a metal-bound hydroxide nucleophile. Evidence for this species is based on the similarities between the pH dependence of the EPR spectrum of Cluster C and the for the for CO, deter-... 

The key intermediate 124 was prepared starting with tryptophyl bromide alkylation of 3-acetylpyridine, to give 128 in 95% yield (Fig. 37) [87]. Reduction of 128 with sodium dithionite under buffered (sodium bicarbonate) conditions lead to dihydropyridine 129, which could be cyclized to 130 upon treatment with methanolic HC1. Alternatively, 128 could be converted directly to 130 by sodium dithionite if the sodium bicarbonate was omitted. Oxidation with palladium on carbon produced pyridinium salt 131, which could then be reduced to 124 (as a mixture of isomers) upon reaction with sodium boro-hydride. Alternatively, direct reduction of 128 with sodium borohydride gave a mixture of compounds, from which cyclized derivative 132 could be isolated in 30% yield after column chromatography [88]. Reduction of 132 with lithium tri-f-butoxyaluminum hydride then gave 124 (once again as a mixture of isomers) in 90% yield. 

A limited number of such reactions have been recently published, and the results are compiled in Table 5. The first example is the reduction of azido compound 76 by sodium dithionite to the corresponding amine 77. Furthermore, some nucleophilic substitutions of the chlorine substituents of heterocycles 78 and 80 have also been reported these compounds, when reacted with morpholine and w-bromoaniline, respectively, furnished the substitution products 79 and 81. 

In a bulk silica matrix that differs from the silica nanomatrix regarding only the matrix size but has a similar network structure of silica, several kinetic parameters have been studied and the results demonstrated a diffusion controlled mechanism for penetration of other species into the silica matrix [89-93]. When the silica is used as a catalyst matrix in the liquid phase, slow diffusion of reactants to the catalytic sites within the silica rendered the reaction diffusion controlled [90]. It was also reported that the reduction rate of encapsulated ferricytochrome by sodium dithionite decreased in a bulk silica matrix by an order of magnitude compared to its original reaction rate in a homogeneous solution [89], In gas-phase reactions in the silica matrix, diffusion limitations were observed occasionally [93],... 

An alternative route to sulphones utilizes the reaction of the appropriate activated halide with sodium dithionite or sodium hydroxymethanesulphinite [6], This procedure is limited to the preparation of symmetrical dialkyl sulphones and, although as a one-step reaction from the alkyl halide it is superior to the two-step oxidative route from the dialkyl sulphides, the overall yields tend to be moderately low (the best yield of 62% for dibenzyl sulphoxide using sodium dithionite is obtained after 20 hours at 120°C). The mechanism proposed for the reaction of sodium hydroxymethanesulphinite is shown in Scheme 4.20. The reaction is promoted by the addition of base and the best yield is obtained using Aliquat in the presence of potassium carbonate. It is noteworthy, however, that a comparable yield can be obtained in the absence of the catalyst. The reaction of phenacyl halides with sodium hydroxy-methane sulphinite leads to reductive dehalogenation [7]. 

An intriguing use of a quaternary ammonium salt in a two-phase reaction is to be found with the regeneration of 1 -benzyl-1,4-dihydronicotinamide by sodium dithionite in a biomimetic reduction of thiones to thiols [12], The use of sodium dithionite in the presence of sodium carbonate for the 1,4-reduction of the pyri-dinium salts to 1,4-dihydropyridines is well established but, as both the dithionite and the pyridinium salts are soluble in water and the dihydropyridine and the thione are insoluble in the aqueous phase and totally soluble in the organic phase, it is difficult to identify the role of the quaternary ammonium salt in the reduction cycle. It is clear, however, that in the presence of benzyltriethylammonium chloride, the pyridine system is involved in as many as ten reduction cycles during the complete conversion of the thione into the thiol. In the absence of the catalyst, the thione is recovered quantitatively from the reaction mixture. As yet, the procedure does not appear to have any synthetic utility. 

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