Scientific Notation

Scientific Notation

We have seen that humans find it easy to remember short “strings” of numbers. That was one reason units of measurement were made in different magnitudes.

A science & technology advanced, many accurate measurements were made both in astronomy & nuclear science. These included numbers with “extremely” long strings of numbers both in the whole number & decimal segments. Such numbers are very difficult to remember & do quick mental calculations.

Exponentiation enables us to write such very large or extremely small numbers using fewer numerals. We will take 2 examples.

1. The mass of the Sun has been calculated as1,989,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 kilograms. This can be written as 1.989 X 1030 Kgs.

2. The mass of a proton has been determined as0.00000000000000000000000167 gm. This can be written using scientific notation as 1.67X 10 -24 gm.

Students may not fully understand this notation. But they can see that it is far easier to remember than the original value with its huge string of 0s.

Scientific Notation & the Metric System

The Metric system is made in powers of 10. Hence it is most suited for representing with the scientific notation.