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sodium cyanide

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noun Chemistry.
a white, crystalline, deliquescent, water-soluble, poisonous powder, NaCN, prepared by heating sodium amide with charcoal: used chiefly in casehardening alloys, in the leaching and flotation of ore, and in electroplating.
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Origin of sodium cyanide

First recorded in 1880–85
Dictionary.com Unabridged Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023

How to use sodium cyanide in a sentence

  • When at last apprehended, Siddiqui was carrying a jar containing two pounds of a deadly poison, sodium cyanide.

  • This chloride is then mixed with sodium cyanide in alcoholic solution and distilled, benzyl cyanide being the result.

  • Sodium cyanide is a salt of hydrocyanic acid, which for, some curious reason is called "Prussic acid."

    Creative Chemistry|Edwin E. Slosson

British Dictionary definitions for sodium cyanide

sodium cyanide

noun
a white odourless crystalline soluble poisonous compound with an odour of hydrogen cyanide when damp. It is used for extracting gold and silver from their ores and for case-hardening steel. Formula: NaCN
Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012
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