Sodium amide NaNH

Liquid Ammonia as a Solvent. Liquid ammonia (b.p. --38.4 C) has a high dielectric constant, and is a good solvent for salts, forming ionic solutions. It also has the unusual power of dissolving the alkali metals and alkaline-earth metals without chemical reaction, to form blue solutions which have an extraordinarily high electrical conductivity and a metallic luster. These metallic solutions slowly decompose, with evolution of hydrogen, forming amides, such as sodium amide, NaNH ... 

Because alcohols are much less acidic than carboxylic acids or mineral acids, they don t react with weak bases such as amines or bicarbonate ion, and they react to only a limited extent with metal hydroxides such as NaOH. Alcohols do, however, react with alkali metals and with strong bases such as sodium hydride (NaH), sodium amide (NaNH-2), and Grignard reagents (RMgX). Alkoxides are themselves bases that are frequently used as reagents in organic chemistry. 

A terminal alkyne is an alkyne that has a hydrogen substituents (Fig. H). This hydrogen substituent is acidic and can be removed with strong base (e.g. sodium amide NaNH ) to produce an alkynide (Fig. I). This is an acid-base reaction. 

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