Powers of Ten Review

Powers of 10 indicate how many time to multiply 10 by itself. For example,

103 = 10 10 10 = 1, 000

106 = 10 10 10 10 10 10 = 1, 000, 000

Negative powers are the reciprocals of the corresponding positive powers. For example,
1
1
= 0.001
103 = 3 =
10
1, 000
1
1
= 0.000001
106 = 6 =
10
1, 000, 000
A positive exponent tells how many zeros follow the 1. For example
100 = 1
101 = 10
102 = 100
103 = 1, 000
6

10 = 1, 000
9

10 = 1, 000
10

12

= 1, 000

a thousand
a million
a billion

a trillion

A negative exponent tells how many places are to the right of the decimal point, including the 1.
For example.
100 = 1
101 = 0.1
102 = 0.01
103 = 0.001
6

= 0.001

= 0.001

12

= 0.001

10

10
10

a thousandth
a millionth
a billionth

a trillionth

The three most important properties we will use are multiplication, division, and powers
10a 10b = 10a+b

10a 10b = 10ab

(10a )b = 10ab

As implied above we will use the Short Scale for the names of large and small numbers in
this course: Every new term greater than million is one thousand times larger than the previous
term. Thus, billion means a thousand millions (109 ), trillion means a thousand billions (1012 ), and
so on.