View Full Version : Prefix notation.
tme_tme
Jan 27, 2009, 11:24 PM
70,000,000,000 newton's
Rewrite in prefix notation.
Is the answer this 70n (nano) N (newtons)?
ebaines
Jan 28, 2009, 09:06 AM
is the answer this 70n (nano) N (newtons)?
No - "nano" means 1 billionth. That is, 10^{-9} . You want the notation for billion: 10 ^{+9} . Here's a list of prefixes that will help you:
SI prefix - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SI_prefix)
Capuchin
Jan 28, 2009, 09:47 AM
I suppose this is actually quite tricky when you first come to learn it. One way of remembering is that "small" prefixes often have -i or -o on the end, and big prefixes are normally -a, the only exception being kilo- (and hecto- but that is rarely used).
Hopefully that will help you get it round the right way :)