Question

At a temperature of 20⁰ C, the common amoeba reproduces by splitting in half every 24 hours. If we start with a single amoeba, how many will be left:

(a) 8 days
(b) 16 days

Answer 1

The common amoeba reproduces by splitting in half every 24 hours. After 8 days, there will be 256 amoebas. After 16 days, there will be 65,536 amoebas.

Step-by-step explanation:

The common amoeba reproduces by splitting in half every 24 hours. If we start with a single amoeba, we can calculate the number of amoebas after a certain number of days using exponential growth.

(a) After 8 days:

The number of amoebas doubles every 24 hours. So after 8 days, which is equivalent to 8 x 24 = 192 hours, we can calculate the number of amoebas as:

Number of amoebas = 2^((192/24)) = 2^8 = 256.

So, there will be 256 amoebas after 8 days.

(b) After 16 days:

Using the same formula, we can calculate the number of amoebas after 16 days:

Number of amoebas = 2^((16 x 24) / 24) = 2^16 = 65,536.

So, there will be 65,536 amoebas after 16 days.