Astronomy and Space

Hydrazine

Hydrazine is an inorganic compound with the chemical formula N2H4. It is a simple pnictogen hydride, and is a colourless flammable liquid with an ammonia-like odour. Hydrazine is highly hazardous unless handled in solution as, for example, hydrazine hydrate (N2H4·xH2O). Hydrazine is mainly used as a foaming agent in preparing polymer foams, but applications also include its uses as a precursor to pharmaceuticals and agrochemicals, as well as a long-term storable propellant for in-space spacecraft propulsion. Additionally, hydrazine is used in various rocket fuels and to prepare the gas precursors used in airbags. Hydrazine is used within both nuclear and conventional electrical power plant steam cycles as an oxygen scavenger to control concentrations of dissolved oxygen in an effort to reduce corrosion. As of 2000, approximately 120,000 tons of hydrazine hydrate (corresponding to a 64% solution of hydrazine in water by weight) were manufactured worldwide per year. Hydrazines are a class of organic substances derived by replacing one or more hydrogen atoms in hydrazine by an organic group. In 2019, the first examples of isomorphism between organic hydrazinosolvates and their corresponding hydrates were discovered, demonstrating that hydrazine molecules can undergo isomorphous substitution by water within crystalline frameworks such as 18-crown-6 complexes.

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See also

• ▸Arthur Hoag
• ▸Erechtheion
• ▸Gamma-ray astronomy

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