4-016 Writing Decimals There are many ways to write the same decimal. S ituectucsoven ope inos thud ta ‘hundred serine jeptbousendis More Hep See 006,014, 047,073 Decimals: Powers of 10 In the decimal system, the value of each place is a different power of 10. Powers of 10 can also be less than 1: they can have negative exponents. Do mish Bice Scientific Notation Sometimes you need to write decimals that are very small or very large. You can use scientific notation to write these decimals. With scientific notation, you don't need to count lots of zeros every time you read the number. To write a number in scientific notation, write it as a product of two factors: (a decimal greater than or equal to 1 but less than 10) X (a power of 10)XAMPLE |: Light travels at a speed of about 18,000,000,000 meters per minute. Write this number in scientific notation. (Source: Encyclopedia Britennica) 18,000,000,000 = 1.8 x 10,000,000,000 = 1.8 X 10 -———power of 10 a decimal = 1 and < 10 E 2: Light travels | meter in 0.0000000033 second. Write 33 in scientific notation. 0.0000000 To write numbers between 0 and | in scientific notation, you use negative exponents. 0,0000006 = 3.3 x 0.000000001 = 3.3 x 10° power of 10 with a us negative exponent a decimal = 1 and < 10