Question

A colony of bacteria starts with 9 bacteria at noon. If the number

of bacteria triples every 20 minutes, how many bacteria will be
present at 2:40 pm that afternoon?

Answer 1

59,049
You just input 9*3 into a calculator and hit ‘equals’ 8 times, since there are 8 20-minute increments in 2 hours and 40 min.