Question

In a sorted list of students, how many iterations, at most, will a binary search take to find a particular name in the worst case?

A) Logarithmic to the base 2 of the number of students
B) Quadratic in the number of students
C) Linear in the number of students
D) Constant, regardless of the number of students

Answer 1

The most iterations a binary search will take in the worst case is logarithmic to the base 2 of the number of students, indicating option A as the correct answer.

Step-by-step explanation:

In a sorted list of students, the maximum number of iterations a binary search will take to find a particular name in the worst case is logarithmic to the base 2 of the number of students. This is because in each iteration, a binary search algorithm halves the number of elements to be searched, until the element is found or the subset cannot be split further. Therefore, the correct answer is A) Logarithmic to the base 2 of the number of students.