First is to find the pattern: 16-4=12, 36-16=20, 64-36=28, 100-64=36, 144-100=44. We see that in the pattern the next number is incremented by 8. So the next number should be 44+8=52 and we add that to the last number of the sequence: 144+52=196 and that is the next number in the sequence.