Essay

Procedural Steps for Solving Exponential Growth Models in Public Health

As a program assistant at a local public health clinic, you are helping analyze data for a community health report. A colleague has modeled the growth of a bacterial colony in a contaminated water sample using the exponential equation 2500=100(1.05)t{}2500 = 100(1.05)^t, where tt represents time in hours. Because the bases cannot be easily rewritten to match, you must solve for tt using logarithms.

Write a short explanation of the algebraic procedure to solve this equation. In your essay, recall and describe:

  1. The first step required to isolate the exponential expression before applying a logarithm.
  2. The specific property of logarithms that allows you to move the variable tt from the exponent to a coefficient position.
  3. The final algebraic step used to solve for tt after the variable is a coefficient.

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Updated 2026-06-03

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