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The picture to the right illustrates 3 / 4 of a cake. Fractions can be used to represent ratios and division. [1] Thus the fraction 3 / 4 can be used to represent the ratio 3:4 (the ratio of the part to the whole), and the division 3 ÷ 4 (three divided by four).
In the second step, they were divided by 3. The final result, 4 / 3 , is an irreducible fraction because 4 and 3 have no common factors other than 1. The original fraction could have also been reduced in a single step by using the greatest common divisor of 90 and 120, which is 30.
The square root of a positive integer is the product of the roots of its prime factors, because the square root of a product is the product of the square roots of the factors. Since p 2 k = p k , {\textstyle {\sqrt {p^{2k}}}=p^{k},} only roots of those primes having an odd power in the factorization are necessary.
A root of degree 2 is called a square root and a root of degree 3, a cube root. Roots of higher degree are referred by using ordinal numbers, as in fourth root, twentieth root, etc. The computation of an n th root is a root extraction. For example, 3 is a square root of 9, since 3 2 = 9, and −3 is also a square root of 9, since (−3) 2 = 9.
Simplification is the process of replacing a mathematical expression by an equivalent one that is simpler (usually shorter), according to a well-founded ordering. Examples include:
[8] [9] In programming languages such as Ada, [10] Fortran, [11] Perl, [12] Python [13] and Ruby, [14] a double asterisk is used, so x 2 is written as x ** 2. The plus–minus sign , ±, is used as a shorthand notation for two expressions written as one, representing one expression with a plus sign, the other with a minus sign.
A complex fraction is a fraction whose numerator or denominator, or both, contains a fraction. A simple fraction contains no fraction either in its numerator or its denominator. A fraction is in lowest terms if the only factor common to the numerator and the denominator is 1. An expression which is not in fractional form is an integral ...
The simplified equation is not entirely equivalent to the original. For when we substitute y = 0 and z = 0 in the last equation, both sides simplify to 0, so we get 0 = 0 , a mathematical truth. But the same substitution applied to the original equation results in x /6 + 0/0 = 1 , which is mathematically meaningless .