IM 6.6.12 Lesson: Meaning of Exponents

You find a brass bottle that looks really old. When you rub some dirt off of the bottle, a genie appears! The genie offers you a reward. You must choose one:

• $50,000; or
• A magical $1 coin. The coin will turn into two coins on the first day. The two coins will turn into four coins on the second day. The four coins will double to 8 coins on the third day. The genie explains the doubling will continue for 28 days.

What do  and  represent in this situation? Evaluate  and  without a calculator.

How many days would it take for the number of magical coins to exceed $50,000?

Will the value of the magical coins exceed a million dollars within the 28 days? Explain or show your reasoning.

Explore the applet. Why do you think it stops?

A scientist is growing a colony of bacteria in a petri dish. She knows that the bacteria are growing and that the number of bacteria doubles every hour. When she leaves the lab at 5 p.m., there are 100 bacteria in the dish. When she comes back the next morning at 9 a.m., the dish is completely full of bacteria. At what time was the dish half full?

Here are some expressions. All but one of them equals 16. Find the one that is not equal to 16.

Explain how you know.

Write three expressions containing exponents so that each expression equals 81.