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Preparation of Hyponitrite from Nitrite through 

 Oxyamidosulphonate. 



By 



Edward Divers, M. D., D. Sc, F. R. S., Prof., 

 Imperial University, Tokyo, 

 and 

 Tamemasa Haga, D. Sc, F. C. S. 



Through siilphonation followed by hydrolysis, an alkali 

 nitrite is readily converted into the unstal)le oxyamidosulpho- 

 nate, which, in a solution saturated with potassium hydroxide, 

 gets all its hydrogen replaced by potassium and is at the same 

 instant resolved into hyponitrite and sulphite — 2HONH.S03Na + 

 4KOH=(KON)2 + 2KSO3Na+20H2. This remarkable change was 

 made known by us in 1889 (this Journal, 3, 211), along with 

 the fact that in it a rich source of hyponitrite had been lighted 

 upon, since at least half the quantity of hyponitrite equivalent 

 to the nitrite taken could be secured. But this productiveness, 

 it was pointed out, depended upon our method of getting ox- 

 imidosulphonate being employed, and the description of the 

 method was not published till five years later, before when, 

 consequently, the new source of hyponitrite could not be used 

 advantageously by others. Even since then the method has 

 escaped the notice of seven separate workers upon hyponitrites, 

 Thum, W. Wislicenus, Paal and Kretschmer, Tanatar, D. H. 

 Jackson, Piloty, and Hantzsch and Kaufmann, to be at last, 

 however, taken up by Kirschner {Z. anorg. Cheni., 1898, 16, 

 424). Indeed, it may be said to have been rediscovered by 

 Piloty,'^who, in a paper upon * an oxidation of hydroxylamine 

 by benzenesulphonic chloride,' {Berichte, 1896, 29, 1559), de- 



