Treating arylamines with nitrous acid gives aryldiazonium salts that are effective substrates in nucleophilic aromatic substitution reactions. The diazonio group in these salts can be easily displaced by different nucleophiles, yielding a wide variety of substituted benzenes. The leaving group departs as nitrogen gas, and this easy elimination is the driving force for the substitution reaction.
In the Sandmeyer reaction, for example, the diazonio group is replaced by a chloro, bromo, or cyano...

Arenediazonium substitution reactions occur when the diazonium group is substituted by various functional groups such as halides, hydroxyl, nitrile, etc. For instance, arenediazonium salts react with copper(I) salts of chloride, bromide, or cyanide to form corresponding aryl chlorides, bromides, and nitriles. These reactions are named Sandmeyer reactions. Although the mechanism of this reaction is complicated, as illustrated in Figure 1, they are believed to progress via an aryl copper...

The reaction of weakly electrophilic aryldiazonium (also called arenediazonium) salts with highly activated aromatic compounds leads to the formation of products with an —N=N— link, called an azo linkage. This reaction, presented in Figure 1, is known as diazo coupling and occurs without the loss of the nitrogen atoms of the aryldiazonium salt. Highly activated aromatic compounds such as phenols or arylamines favor the diazo coupling reaction. The coupling generally occurs at the para position.

Nitrous acid, a weak acid, is prepared in situ via the reaction of sodium nitrite with a strong acid under cold conditions. This nitrous acid prepared in situ reacts with primary arylamines to form arenediazonium salts. Such reactions are known as diazotization reactions. As shown in Figure 1, the formation of arenediazonium salts begins with the decomposition of nitrous acid in an acidic solution to give nitrosonium ions.

The simplest aromatic amine is phenylamine, which contains an –NH2 functionality directly attached to an aromatic ring. The name aniline is designated for this skeleton. As shown in Figure 1, the common names of the functionalized anilines involve prefixes ortho-, meta-, and para- to indicate the substitution position. Different functionalized aniline derivatives also have notable trivial names.

Nitrous acid is a relatively weak and unstable acid prepared in situ by the reaction of sodium nitrite and cold, dilute hydrochloric acid. In an acidic solution, the nitrous acid undergoes protonation when it loses water to form a nitrosonium ion—an electrophile. Nitrous acid reacts with primary amines to give diazonium salts. The reaction is called diazotization of primary amines.