how to find number of moles

mole

chemistry

Alternate titles: gram atom, gram molecular weight, gram molecule, mol

How is a mole defined?

How is a mole calculated?

What is Avogadro's number?

What is the molar mass formula?

Learn about the concept of the Ideal Gas Law

Overview of how Avogadro's number is used to measure the number of units of any substance.
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mole, also spelled mol, in chemistry, a standard scientific unit for measuring large quantities of very small entities such as atoms, molecules, or other specified particles.

The mole designates an extremely large number of units, 6.02214076 × 10²³. The General Conference on Weights and Measures defined the mole as this number for the International System of Units (SI) effective from May 20, 2019. The mole was previously defined as the number of atoms determined experimentally to be found in 12 grams of carbon-12. The number of units in a mole also bears the name Avogadro's number, or Avogadro's constant, in honour of the Italian physicist Amedeo Avogadro (1776–1856). Avogadro proposed that equal volumes of gases under the same conditions contain the same number of molecules, a hypothesis that proved useful in determining atomic and molecular weights and which led to the concept of the mole. (See Avogadro's law.)

The number of atoms or other particles in a mole is the same for all substances. The mole is related to the mass of an element in the following way: one mole of carbon-12 atoms has 6.02214076 × 10²³ atoms and a mass of 12 grams. In comparison, one mole of oxygen consists, by definition, of the same number of atoms as carbon-12, but it has a mass of 15.999 grams. Oxygen, therefore, has a greater mass than carbon. This reasoning also can be applied to molecular or formula weights.

The concept of the mole helps to put quantitative information about what happens in a chemical equation on a macroscopic level. For example, in the chemical reaction 2H₂O → O₂ + 2H₂, two moles of water are decomposed into two moles of molecular hydrogen and one mole of molecular oxygen. The mole can be used to determine the simplest formula of a compound and to calculate the quantities involved in chemical reactions. When dealing with reactions that take place in solutions, the related concept of molarity is useful. Molarity (M) is defined as the number of moles of a solute in a litre of solution.

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The Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica This article was most recently revised and updated by Erik Gregersen, Senior Editor.

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