Question

A colony of bacteria is growing exponentially according to the function below, where t is in hours. How many bacteria are there after 8 hours? Round to the nearest integer and do not include units in your answer. B(t) = 4 e0.8t

Answer 1

The growth of the bacteria is expressed as:

B(t) = 4 e^0.8t

where t is the time in units of hours. If the bacteria is allowed to grow for 8 hours then the number of bacteria present would be,


B(t) = 4 e^0.8(8)
B(t) = 2407

Answer 2

To be able to determine the number of bacteria after 8 hours, substitute 8 for all the t's in the given function.
                            B(t) = 4 x e^0.8t
                        B(8) = 4 x e^(0.8)(8)
The numerical value of B(8) is 2407.38. Therefore, there are approximately 2407 bacteria.