Suraj Prasad
Last Activity: 10 Years ago
Benzene reacts with chlorine or bromine in an electrophilic substitution reaction, but only in the presence of a catalyst. The catalyst is either aluminium chloride (or aluminium bromide if you are reacting benzene with bromine) or iron.
Strictly speaking iron isn't a catalyst, because it gets permanently changed during the reaction. It reacts with some of the chlorine or bromine to form iron(III) chloride, FeCl3, or iron(III) bromide, FeBr3.