To find the number of bacteria at 8:00 a.m., we need to go back one hour from 9:00 a.m. to 8:00 a.m. Since the bacteria double every hour, we can use the information we have:
At 9:00 a.m., there were 120 bacteria. Because the culture doubles every hour, we can express the number of bacteria an hour earlier (at 8:00 a.m.) with the following equation:
\[ n = \frac{120}{2} \]
where \( n \) is the number of bacteria at 8:00 a.m.
Calculating that:
\[ n = \frac{120}{2} = 60 \]
So, there were 60 bacteria at 8:00 a.m.
In summary, the equation representing the number of bacteria, \( n \), at 8:00 a.m. is \( n = \frac{120}{2} \) and the number of bacteria was 60.
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