Potassium cyanate is often preferred to the sodium salt, which is less soluble in water and less readily available in pure form.
Potassium cyanate is used as a basic raw material for various organic syntheses, including, urea derivatives, semicarbazides, carbamates and isocyanates.
[2][7] Potassium cyanate has been used to reduce the percentage of sickled erythrocytes under certain conditions and has also increased the number of deformalities.
In an aqueous solution, it has prevented irreversibly the in vitro sickling of hemoglobins containing human erythrocytes during deoxygenization.
Intermediates and impurities include biuret, cyanuric acid, and potassium allophanate (KO2CNHC(O)NH2), as well as unreacted starting urea, but these species are unstable at 400 °C.