Finding recipriocal and expressing in scientific notation.

I seem to understand the chapter im working on, but every homework problem I come across im clueless.

Find the recipriocal and express in scientific notation
6.25 X 10^-3

I'm not sure exactly how to go about it, I found the answer to that about, 6,250. But, I dont know if im supposed to find the reciprical before or after, im not sure if im supposed to change it at all. Help?

colormekaylee said:

I seem to understand the chapter im working on, but every homework problem I come across im clueless.

Find the recipriocal and express in scientific notation
6.25 X 10^-3

I'm not sure exactly how to go about it, I found the answer to that about, 6,250. But, I dont know if im supposed to find the reciprical before or after, im not sure if im supposed to change it at all. Help?

Click to expand...

The problem as stated is already in scientific notation. The reciprocal of a fraction can be obtained by simply interchanging the numerator and denominator. For instance, the reciprocal of 3/7 is 7/3 because 3/7 x 7/3 = 1. So, if I were you, I would express your given quantity as a fraction, interchange the numerator and denominator, then express that in scientific notation. For instance, if I were to do that for 2.5 X 10[sup:ibr70mw7]-4[/sup:ibr70mw7] I would express it as...
\(\displaystyle \frac{2.5}{10000}\)
Interchange numerator and denominator...
\(\displaystyle \frac{10000}{2.5}\)
Simplify...
\(\displaystyle \frac{10000}{2.5}=\frac{100000}{25}=4000\)
Convert to scientific notation.
4000 = 4.0 x 10[sup:ibr70mw7]3[/sup:ibr70mw7]