To express the federal debt of Country C, which is $278,560,125,000, in the form of a single digit times an integer power of 10, we can follow these steps:
- We can first move the decimal point in 278,560,125,000 to the left until there is one digit to the left of the decimal.
- This means we convert 278,560,125,000 to 2.78560125 (moving the decimal point 11 places to the left).
- Since we moved the decimal 11 places, we multiply by \(10^{11}\).
Thus, we have:
\[ 2.78560125 \times 10^{11} \]
Now, when we round \(2.78560125\) to one significant figure, it becomes \(2.8\), which isn't one of the options provided. However, looking closely at the provided options, \(2.79 x 10^{11}\) is very close to our rounded value and fits the format we need.
So, the closest estimation of the amount in scientific notation is:
\[ \boxed{2.79 \times 10^{11}} \]
2 answers