Precalculus (6th Edition) Blitzer

Published by Pearson
ISBN 10: 0-13446-914-3
ISBN 13: 978-0-13446-914-0

Chapter 3 - Section 3.5 - Exponential Growth and Decay; Modeling Data - Exercise Set - Page 506: 28

Answer

$ t\approx 17,121.7$ years

Work Step by Step

Model: $ A=A_{0}e^{kt}$ Unknown: $ k $, when $ A=0.5A_{0},\ t=7340$ $0.5A_{0}=A_{0}e^{k\cdot 7340}\qquad... /\div A_{0}$ $0.5=e^{k\cdot 7340}\qquad.../\ln(...)$ $-0.693147=7340k\qquad.../\div(7340)$ $ k\approx-0.000094$ So, our model is $ A=A_{0}e^{-0.000094t}$ Now we find $ t $ for $ A=0.2A_{0}$ $0.2A_{0}=A_{0}e^{-0.000094t}\qquad... /\div A_{0}$ $0.2=e^{-0.000094t}\qquad.../\ln(...)$ $\ln 0.2 =-0.000094t\qquad.../\div-0.000094$ $\displaystyle \frac{\ln 0.2}{-0.000094}=t $ $ t\approx 17,121.7$ years
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