Zinc/hydrazine: A low cost-facile system for the reduction of nitro compounds

The nitro group in aliphatic and aromatic nitro compounds also containing. reducible substituents such as ethene, nitrile, carboxylic acid, phenol, halogen, ester etc., are selectively and rapidly reduced at room temperature to corresponding amines in good yields by employing 99-100% hydrazine hydrate, in the presence of commercial zinc dust. It was observed that, this system is equally compatible with existing methods, which employ expensive catalysts like palladium, platinum, ruthenium etc.