Question

Which of the following expressions is a common factor when the expressions x2 -9 and 32 – 50 + 6 are factored? A. : +3 в. x — 3 C. 2 - 2 D. x2

Answer 1

Here, we want to get the common factor when the two given expressions are factorised

We can factorize the first expression by the use of differeence of two squares

We have this as;

`x^2-9\text{ = (x+3)(x-3)}`

For the second expression, we have the factorization as follows;

`x^2-5x+6=x^2-3x-2x+6\text{ = (x-3)-2(x-3) = (x-2)(x-3)}`

What this mean is that we have the common factor of the two expressions as (x-3)