Question

At the end of fiscal year 2004, the federal debt of Country C is $278,560,125,000. What is the closest estimation of this amount? Express your answer in the form of a single digit times an integer power of 10.(1 point) Responses 3 × 10 rasied to the power of −11 3 times 10 rasied to the power of negative 11 baseline 3 × 10 rasied to the power of 11 3 times 10 rasied to the power of 11 2.79 × 10 rasied to the power of 11 2.79 times 10 rasied to the power of 11 2 × 10 rasied to the power of 11

Answer 1

To express the federal debt of Country C, which is $278,560,125,000, in scientific notation, we first identify the significant digits and the appropriate power of ten.

1. The number 278,560,125,000 can be written as:

   • 2.78560125 × 10^11 (by moving the decimal point 11 places to the left).

2. For estimation, we can round the significant figure to one digit before the decimal. The digit in the tens place is 7, which means we round up the leading digit 2.7 to 3.

3. Therefore, we can round it off to:

   • 3 × 10^11.

The closest estimation of $278,560,125,000 in scientific notation is:

• 3 × 10^11.