Subtract Numbers in Scientific Notation Practice

Question

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Question
Earth’s radius is approximately 3,959 miles, while Jupiter’s radius is approximately 4.3441×104
miles. How much bigger is Jupiter’s radius compared to Earth’s? Express your answer in scientific notation. Do not round your answer.

Answer 1

To find out how much bigger Jupiter's radius is compared to Earth's radius, we need to subtract Earth's radius from Jupiter's radius.

Jupiter's radius: \( 4.3441 \times 10^4 \) miles Earth's radius: \( 3,959 \) miles

First, we need to express Earth's radius in scientific notation:

\[ 3,959 = 3.959 \times 10^3 \]

Now we can perform the subtraction:

\[ Jupiter's \ radius - Earth's \ radius = (4.3441 \times 10^4) - (3.959 \times 10^3) \]

To subtract these, we need to have both numbers in the same powers of ten. We can rewrite \( 3.959 \times 10^3 \) to match the same exponent as \( 10^4 \):

\[ 3.959 \times 10^3 = 0.3959 \times 10^4 \]

Now we can proceed with the subtraction:

\[ 4.3441 \times 10^4 - 0.3959 \times 10^4 = (4.3441 - 0.3959) \times 10^4 \]

Calculating the subtraction:

\[ 4.3441 - 0.3959 = 3.9482 \]

So we have:

\[ 3.9482 \times 10^4 \]

Therefore, the difference in radii, expressed in scientific notation, is:

\[ \boxed{3.9482 \times 10^4} \text{ miles} \]