Final answer:
The total number of project teams containing at least 2 biologists from the given group of new hires can be calculated using combinations. By choosing 2 biologists and then the remaining 4 members, the correct number of teams is 4,290.
Step-by-step explanation:
The question is asking for the total number of project teams that could be formed from a group of new hires that contains at least 2 biologists. We can solve this by using combinations since the order of selection does not matter. We first choose 2 biologists out of the 4 available, and then we can choose the remaining 4 members of the project team out of the 13 remaining hires (6 chemists, 3 environmental scientists, and 2 economists).
The correct formula to calculate this would be using combinations: C(4,2) for choosing 2 biologists and C(13,4) for choosing the remaining 4 team members from the other hires, and then multiplying these two values together.
The formula is therefore:
C(4,2) × C(13,4)
We can then calculate the values:
C(4,2) = 4! / (2!(4-2)!) = 6
C(13,4) = 13! / (4!(13-4)!) = 715
Multiplying these together, we get:
6 × 715 = 4290
So, the total number of project teams that could be formed with at least 2 biologists is 4290.