An element with mass 910 grams decays by 16.6% per minute. How much of the element is remaining after 20 minutes, to the nearest 1oth of a gram?Answer:
Q. An element with mass 910 grams decays by 16.6% per minute. How much of the element is remaining after 20 minutes, to the nearest 1oth of a gram?Answer:
Understand Problem and Formula: Understand the problem and determine the formula to use.We know that the element decays by 16.6% per minute. This means that each minute, the element retains 100%−16.6%=83.4% of its mass from the previous minute. To find the remaining mass after 20 minutes, we can use the formula for exponential decay:Remaining mass = Initial mass ×(1−decay rate)timewhere the decay rate is 16.6% or 0.166, and time is 20 minutes.
Convert Decay Rate: Convert the decay rate to a decimal and calculate the remaining percentage each minute.Decay rate as a decimal = 10016.6%=0.166Remaining percentage each minute = 1−0.166=0.834
Apply Exponential Decay: Apply the exponential decay formula to calculate the remaining mass after 20 minutes.Remaining mass = 910 grams ×(0.834)20
Calculate Remaining Mass: Calculate the remaining mass using the values from the previous step.Remaining mass = 910×(0.834)20
Perform Calculation: Perform the calculation.Remaining mass ≈910×(0.834)20≈910×0.049≈44.59 grams
Round Remaining Mass: Round the remaining mass to the nearest 10th of a gram.Rounded remaining mass = 44.6 grams