The approximate areas of Rhode Island and Washington, D.C. are listed below:

Question

Rhode Island: 4 x 10^3 square kilometers
Washington, D.C: 1.77 x 10^2 square kilometers
How much larger is Rhode Island? Express your answer using scientific notation.

Answer 1

To find how much larger Rhode Island is compared to Washington, D.C., we need to subtract the area of Washington, D.C. from the area of Rhode Island.

Given:

• Area of Rhode Island = $4\times {10}^3$ square kilometers
• Area of Washington, D.C. = $1.77\times {10}^2$ square kilometers

First, we need to express both areas in the same power of 10 for ease of subtraction. We can express $1.77\times {10}^2$ in terms of ${10}^3$:

$$1.77\times {10}^2=0.177\times {10}^3$$

Now we can perform the subtraction:

$$\text{Area of Rhode Island}-\text{Area of Washington, D.C.}=(4\times {10}^3)-(0.177\times {10}^3)$$

Combining the coefficients:

$$=(4-0.177)\times {10}^3=3.823\times {10}^3$$

Thus, the area of Rhode Island is approximately $3.823\times {10}^3$ square kilometers larger than the area of Washington, D.C.

Therefore, the final answer is:

$$\boxed{{\displaystyle 3.823\times {10}^3}}$$