Sodium borohydride (Medium reducing)

Sodium borohydride is intermediate to the jackhammer that is LAH and the pussycat that is cyanoborohydride.

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Borohydride is just on the cusp of reducing protons to hydrogen. In acidic solution, it'll bubble off hydrogen, in basic solution, it's stable enough that Aldrich sells the stuff.

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Good point Uncle Al. The cation makes a huge difference in reducing strength. I can't remember the order of things, but I do remember learning about it...

By Vince Noir (not verified) on 21 Aug 2008 #permalink

I used to use sodium borohydride to reduce soluble platinum salts in waste solutions to precipitate and recover the platinum. Of course management insisted that this operation only be performed at night--I guess they had a problem with being in the building while hydrogen was being generated. ;-)