How to calculate how many mole of a element are in X moles of a compound?

[DerpenWolf]

I'm a bit rusty on my chemistry knowledge but I'm trying to remember how to find out how many moles of an element are in X moles of a compound!

An example of this is as follows:

You have .40 moles of Al2Si4O10(OH)2, How many moles of aluminum are in this substance

I just need to remember how to calculate this and so far the internet seems to just want to tell me how to convert moles to mass rather than be useful. I appreciate the help!

[crubs]

Moles are a count of the number of particles. Since there are 2 Aluminum atoms stuck to every molecule, you'd have two moles of aluminum for every mole of the given compound. In other words, you'd have 0.80 moles of Aluminum in 0.40 moles of your compound.

[andrewas]

Simple enough. You have .4 moles of molecules, each molecule contains 2 aluminium, so you have .8 moles of aluminium.

[Kryten]

There are two atoms of Al per molecule, so two moles of them on one mole of it. 2*0.4=0.8mol Al.

[-Velocity-]

I'm a bit rusty on my chemistry knowledge but I'm trying to remember how to find out how many moles of an element are in X moles of a compound!

An example of this is as follows:

You have .40 moles of Al2Si4O10(OH)2, How many moles of aluminum are in this substance

I just need to remember how to calculate this and so far the internet seems to just want to tell me how to convert moles to mass rather than be useful. I appreciate the help!

It would be 0.4*2 = 0.8 mol of aluminum atoms. I'm not a chemist but I believe that mol is supposed to measure the number of particles. So you have to be careful and specific about what you're talking about. For example, if you somehow decomposed this hypothetical compound and recovered just the oxygen, then the question "how many mol do you have of oxygen?" is not really valid. Oxygen what? Oxygen atoms, O2 molecules, or O3 molecules??

[DerpenWolf]

Thanks for the help! I was actually really overthinking this to the point where I suspected large amounts of conversions!