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 December 4th, 2011, 09:19 PM #1 Newbie   Joined: Dec 2011 Posts: 2 Thanks: 0 Confused on a problem, please help. I don't know what this problem wants me to do. I've been using the equation A(t)=Ao(e)^kt. The growth has been uninhibited as you can see. Is this asking me to change "e" to "3"? The follow up to this problem is asking for the 1-unit growth factor. I really have spent a significant amount of time trying to work this problem on scratch paper. Please help. I have a feeling this is the kind of problem that is not very hard to solve. Problem: A certain population of bacteria triples every 3 hours. What is the 3-unit growth factor?
 December 4th, 2011, 09:48 PM #2 Senior Member     Joined: Jul 2010 From: St. Augustine, FL., U.S.A.'s oldest city Posts: 12,211 Thanks: 521 Math Focus: Calculus/ODEs Re: Confused on a problem, please help. We have: $P(t)=P_03^{\frac{t}{3}}$ For 3-unit, let u = 3t: $P(u)=P_03^u$ The 3 unit growth factor is then 3.
 December 4th, 2011, 10:05 PM #3 Newbie   Joined: Dec 2011 Posts: 2 Thanks: 0 Re: Confused on a problem, please help. Thanks for the response. I still don't know what the 3 unit growth factor actual is. Is it the number I put in for t to make the exponent 1? I'm lost. Can you recommend a section of the book for me to look in? We've done logarithms and now exponential growth and decay models. This is an extra credit problem but I just can't find anywhere in the book that solves the problem with the method that you used. I'm sure that is right but there is no sense for me to write that answer unless I know what I'm doing. I appreciate it anyway, thank you.
 December 4th, 2011, 10:18 PM #4 Senior Member     Joined: Jul 2010 From: St. Augustine, FL., U.S.A.'s oldest city Posts: 12,211 Thanks: 521 Math Focus: Calculus/ODEs Re: Confused on a problem, please help. Well, basically every three hours (or units), the population triples, so the 3-unit (or every 3 hours) growth factor is 3.

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# a certain population of bacteria triples in number every 3 hours. What is the 3-unit growth factor?

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