Question: Scientist decided to do a study on the population growth of rabbits. Inside a controlled environment, 1000 rabbits were placed.
Six months later, there were 1000Z rabbits. At the beginning of the 3rd year, there were roughly 2828Z rabbits, which was 4 times what the scientists placed in there at the beginning of the 1st year.
If Z is a positive variable, how many rabbits would be there at the beginning of the 11th year?
Answer:
At the beginning of the 11th year, there would be 1,024,000 rabbits.
At the beginning, there were 1000 rabbits. Also, there were 4000 rabbits at the beginning of third year which is equal to 2828Z. Thus, Z = 4000/2828 i.e. 1.414 (the square root of 2)
Note that 2828Z can be represented as 2000*Z*Z (Z=1.414), which can be further simplified as 1000*Z*Z*Z*Z
Also, it is given that at the end of 6 months, there were 1000Z rabbits.
It is clear that the population growth is 1.414 times every six months i.e. 2 times every year. After N years, the population would be 1000*(Z^(2N)) i.e. 1000*(2^N)
Thus, at the beginning of the 11th year (i.e. after 10 years), there would be 1000*(2^10) i.e. 1,024,000 rabbits.