Question

Neptune's average distance from the sun is 4.503×10^9 km. mercury's average distance from the sun is 5.791×10^7 km. About how many times farther from the sun is Neptune than Mercury? Write your answer in scientific notation.

Answer 1

Given ,

Neptune's average distance from the sun is

$4.503\times10^9\text{ km}$

Mercury's average distance from the sun is,

$5.791\times10^7\text{ km}$

Hence to find out the value by which Neptune is farther from the Sun than the Mercury, we can take take the ratio of the two values. That is,

$\frac{4.503\times10^9}{5.791\times10^7}=0.7776\times10^{9-7}=77.76$

Thus, the Neptune is 77.76 times farther than the Mercury.