CliffStudySolver Chemistry
Chapter One
Measurement and
Units of Measurement
At the core of any science is measurement. Being able to measure volumes, pressures,
masses, and temperatures as well as the ability to count atoms and molecules allows
chemists to understand nature more precisely. Modern science uses the International
System of Units (SI) that was adopted worldwide in 1960. The metric system of measurement,
which is consistent with the International System, is widely used in chemistry and is the
principal system used in this book.
Chemists often have to work with numbers that are very, very small or very, very large. It is more
convenient to express numbers of this kind in scientific notation, so that is the first topic to look at
in this chapter.
Writing Numbers in Scientific Notation
It is likely that you have already seen numbers expressed in scientific notation on your calculator.
With only 8 or 9 spaces to display numbers, calculators must resort to scientific notation to show
very small or very large numbers. In scientific notation a number is expressed in this form
a x [10.sup.p]
where "a" is a number between 1 and 10 (o ... read full excerpt from CliffsStudySolver Chemistry ebook
