Amount of substance in use in chemical engineering in the United States is the pound-mole, having the symbol lb-mol. One pound-mole is . When quoting an amount of substance, it is necessary to specify the entity involved, unless there is no risk of ambiguity. One mole of chlorine could refer either to chlorine atoms, as in 58.44 g of sodium chloride, or to chlorine molecules, as in 22.711 liters of chlorine gas at STP. The simplest way to avoid ambiguity is to replace the term "substance" by the name of the entity or to quote the empirical formula. For example: Amount of substance
Chemical compound for the chemical elements, and subscripts to indicate the number of atoms involved. For example, water is composed of two hydrogen atoms bonded to one oxygen atom: the chemical formula is HO. In the case of non-stoichiometric compounds, the proportions may be reproducible with regard to their preparation, and give fixed proportions of their component elements, but proportions that are not integral [e.g., for palladium hydride, PdH (0.02 < x < 0.58)]. Chemical compounds have a unique and defined chemical structure held together in a defined spatial arrangement by chemical bonds. Chemical compounds can be molecular compounds held together by