Stoichiometry records reactant and product multiplicities in a chemical reaction or a chemical reaction network. The change caused by one reaction is its stoichiometric vector; multiplying by the reaction rate gives its contribution to the concentration equations. For two identical reactants the rate-constant convention absorbs any combinatorial factor.
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Chemistry is fun. Too hard for precise physics (pre quantum computing, see also quantum chemistry), but not too hard for some maths like social sciences.
And it underpins biology.