Mole Day is celebrated on October 23 every year. The day this year will be observed from 6:02 a.m. to 6:02 p.m. The day commemorates chemistry’s measuring unit called “Avogadro’s Number”. The day is celebrated as a means to bring awareness and create interest in the study of Chemistry.
What is a mole?
For a given molecule, one mole is a mass (in grams) whose number is equal to the molar mass of the molecule. For better understanding let us take an example of a water molecule. It has a molar mass of 18 that is one mole of water weighs 18 grams. Similarly, one mole of neon has a molar mass of 20 grams. That is one mole of any substance contains Avagadro’s Number of molecules or atoms of that substance. Madeo Avogadro, for the first time, discovered this relationship and after his death, he received the credit for this.
Mole Day 2020: Theme
The theme of Mole Day 2020 is MOLEzilla!
Mole Day: History
An article appeared in the early 1980s in The Science Teacher about a high school chemistry teacher and her rational for the idea of celebrating the day. From this article, the seed was planted for establishing a national organization.
The National Mole Day Foundation (NMDF) was established on 15 May, 1991. The objective of the National Mole Day Foundation was and continues to get all persons, mainly students, interested or enthused about chemistry. The Foundation in 1992 became a not-for-profit corporation in the State of Wisconsin.
The newly established “National Mole of the Year” Award was first presented at the ChemEd ’93 conference at Buttler University. This award continued with presentations at ChemEd ’95 at Old Dominion University and ChemEd ’97 at the University of Minnesota. Really it is the “Mole-of-the-Every-Other Year” as the award is presented in odd-numbered years at the ChemEd Conferences.
As the years have passed, interest within the National Mole Day Foundation has become widespread. The day is celebrated in various foreign countries, especially in Canada and in Australia. In Australia, the CSIRO (which is analogous to NSTA) encourages every teacher of science subject to celebrate National Mole Day. Therefore, we can say that NMDF was created with the intention to generate interest in chemistry.
