Question

The population of a bacteria colony is growing exponentially, doubling every 6 hours. If there are 150 bacteria currently present, how many (to the nearest ten bacteria) will be present in 10 hours

Answer 1

If rounded to the nearest 10 bacteria, then it would be 500 bacteria.

Explanation:

First multiply 150 by two in order to get 300, that leaves 4 hours to figure out. From there you can figure out the rest by seeing that 4 is 2/3 of 6. I converted it into the decimal number .66. Multiply 300 by .66 to get 198 and then add it to 300 to get 498. Then just round it up to the nearest 10 bacteria which leaves you with the final answer of 500 bacteria.