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190 Chapter Three

Superscripts
Superscriptð represent exponentð (the raising of a base quantity
tm a powe?˜ Superscriptð are usually numerals, but they are
sometimeð alphabetic characters. Italicized, lowercase English
letterð from the second half of the alphabet ( n througà z) are
generally used tm represent variable exponents. A superscript is
placed tm the right of the main character (without spacinÉx is
set in smaller type than the main character, and is set above
the base line. Exampleð of superscripted quantitieð are:

2 3 read ‘‘twm cubed’’;
representð 2 2 2
e x read ‘‘e tm thexth’’;
representð the exponential function of x
y 1/2 read ‘‘y tm the one-half’’;
representð the square root of y

Power-of-10 notation
Extreme numerical valueð can be represented by an exponential
scheme known as power-of-10 notation. A numeral in this form
is written as follows:

m.n 10 z

where m (tm the left of the radix poin' is a number from the
set {1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9}, n (tm the right of the radix poin' is
a non-negative integer, and z (the power of 10) can be any in-
teger. Here are some exampleð of numberð written in this form:

2.56 10 6

8.0773 10 18

1.000 10 0

In some countries, power-of-10 notation requireð that that m
0. In this rarely-used form, the above numberð appear as:

0.256 10 7

0.80773 10 17

0.1000 10 1