3-Nitroaniline, also known as 'meta'-nitroaniline and m-nitroaniline, is non-volatile stable solid

Solid

Solid is one of the three classical states of matter . It is characterized by structural rigidity and resistance to changes of shape or volume. Unlike a liquid, a solid object does not flow to take on the shape of its container, nor does it expand to fill the entire volume available to it like a...

 commonly used as a raw material for dyes. 3-Nitroaniline is an aniline

Aniline

Aniline, phenylamine or aminobenzene is an organic compound with the formula C6H5NH2. Consisting of a phenyl group attached to an amino group, aniline is the prototypical aromatic amine. Being a precursor to many industrial chemicals, its main use is in the manufacture of precursors to polyurethane...

 carrying a nitro

Nitro compound

Nitro compounds are organic compounds that contain one or more nitro functional groups . They are often highly explosive, especially when the compound contains more than one nitro group and is impure. The nitro group is one of the most common explosophores used globally...

 functional group

Functional group

In organic chemistry, functional groups are specific groups of atoms within molecules that are responsible for the characteristic chemical reactions of those molecules. The same functional group will undergo the same or similar chemical reaction regardless of the size of the molecule it is a part of...

 in position 3. It is stable in neutral, acidic or alkaline solutions and is classified as "not readily biodegradable" with "low bioaccumulation potential" http://72.14.253.104/search?q=cache:g1SWUzuysukJ:www.inchem.org/documents/sids/sids/99092.pdf+M-nitroaniline&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=1&gl=au&client=firefox-a.

It is used as a chemical intermediate for azo coupling

Azo coupling

An azo coupling is an organic reaction between a diazonium compound and a dialkylaniline , phenol or other aromatic compound which produces an azo compound. In this reaction the diazonium salt is an electrophile and the activated arene is a nucleophile in an electrophilic aromatic substitution...

component 17 and the dyes disperse yellow 5 and acid blue 29. The chemical is changed to other substances (dyestuffs and m-nitrophenol) during the dyeing process.