What is the definition of scientific notation?

Answer 1

Scientific notation is a way of representing numbers, usually very large or very small, in the form

a*10b where 1 ≤ a < 10 is a decimal number and b is an integer.

Answer 2

Scientific notation expresses any number as a floating-point number (>= 1.0) and (< 10) multiplied by some power of 10.

Numbers larger-than or equal-to 1 are expressed with positive exponents (>= 0).

Numbers smaller-than 1 are expressed with negative exponents.

Examples:

0 = 010^0

1 = 1 x 10^0

4.23 = 4.23 x 10^0

567 = 5.67 x 10^2

0.18 = 1.8 x 10^(-1) = 1 / (1.8 x 10^1)

0.000987 = 9.87 x 10^(-4) = 1 / (9.87 x 10^4)