How are exponents used to represent positive numbers greater than one?

Answer 1

Scientific notation is a way of representing numbers, usually very large or very small, in the form
a*10^b where 1 <= |a| < 10 is a decimal number and b is an integer (negative or positive).
a is called the mantissa and b is called the exponent. To convert a number to scientific notation:

• If the number has no decimal point, then add one at the end.
  
• Then move the decimal point to just after the first digit while counting the number of places you have moved it.
  
• The mantissa of the new number, formed after moving the decimal point is a.
  
• The number of places to the left that the decimal point was moved is b.
  

For example: 23045.06 becomes 2.304506*10^4.