i am having trouble understaing how to write these out in simplest form please help

a. 7^3x7^2x8^5/ 8^4x7x8^-7 for this i got 7/8

b. (a^-2b^4c^3)2

can you explain and show me how to do this?

4 answers

I am having trouble understanding what you mean for part a. Is the x a variable or are you writing it as a times sign to indicate multiplication?

for b I am a little confused too.

a raised to the -2
b raised to the 4
c raised to the 3

should everything in the ( ) be squared?

if so the a^-4 the b^8 and c^6

you should never leave an answer with a negative exponent. You can move it to the denominator of the fraction and make it a^4. Keep the b and c with their exponents in the numerator.
yes they should be.... so that would make sense what about the first equation?
and part a iswhere x is the multiplication.
Checking with what I think you have in your problem

7^3 times 7^2 times 8^5 in the numerator?

If so you can simplify to 7^5 times 8^5 in the numerator

The denominator: 8^4 times 7 times 8^-7
if so you can simplify the denominator to 8^-3 times 7

7^5 times 8^5 divided by 8^-3 times 7

take 7^5 divided by 7^1 gives me 7^4

take 8^5 divided by 8^-3 gives me
8^(5+3) or 8 ^8

I think my final answeris 7^4 times 8^8