percentage

Question

 A light year is 9.46x10^15 metres.the average distance of the planet pluto from the sun is 5.90 x 10^9 kilometres. calculate this distance as a percentage of a light year.

Answer 1

I have explained the mathematical concept/definition for percentage in my earlier post for another similar problem posted by you. So following that here,

 

If X is a percentage of Y, then the percentage value is calculated by

X/Y *100%

 

X = 5.90 *10⁹ km = 5.90*10⁹ *1000 m = 5.90*10⁽⁹⁺³⁾ = 5.90*10¹² m

Y = 9.46 *10¹⁵ m 

 

When calculating percentage values, X and Y should be in same units and so I have changed to km to m for X here in the above calculations.

 

So percentage value is given by,

 

(5.90*10¹²)/(9.46*10¹⁵) *100% = (5.90/9.46)*10^(12-15+2)%

 

= 0.6236*10^(-1) % = 0.06236%