1 trillion grains of rice?

Question

What are the dimensions of a container that i could use to show my students 1 trillion grains of rice? what familiar object could it be as big as?

Answer 1

A search using BING revealed that individual rice grains are usually about 7 millimeters in length and about 1.4 millimeters in diameter.

 

We can think of each grain as a small cylinder with the above dimensions, which means the volume will equal pi • r² • h

 

In this case, V = (0.7mm)² • 7mm • 3.1415 = 10.78mm³

 

One trillion = 1 x 10¹², so the total volume of the rice will be 10.78 x 10¹²mm³

 

We then have to convert that number to cubic meters.

One cubic meter = 1 x 10⁹mm³

so, we divide our grain volume by the conversion factor to get

10.78 x 10³m³

 

You will then need to use that volume to find the dimensions of an object.