How many cell divisions would it take to produce at least 1 000 cells from one cell?

Answer 1

500 cell divisions. Why? Because 500x2=1000. You also could have found the answer by just doing 1000 divided by 2. Which equals obviously 500.

Answer 2

There are mathematical ways to solve questions like this, using 'powers' of numbers, but is it just as easy to do it by simple arithmetic if you don't know about 'powers'. (For example 220 = 1,048,576 which is a clue!) However, the long way might be easier to grasp. You could do it on a piece of paper or on a computer using a spreadsheet.

If you want to know how long it takes for a cell to develop and divide and reach a million, you'll need to know its rate of reproduction.

If each cell takes one minute to divide into two cells, then after 1 minute one cell becomes two cells, then at 2 mins = 4 cells, 3=8, 4=16, 5=32, 6=64, 7=128, 8=256, 9=512, 10=1024, 11=2048, 12=4096, 13=8192, 14=16384, 15=32768, 16=65536, 17=131072, 18=262,144, 19=524,288, and at 20 minutes there will be 1,048,576 cells!

Here are two related questions, which will help with the mathematics in questions like the one asked:-

1. If bacteria cells double every second, and a jar becomes full with one million bacteria cells at 10 o'clock, at what time was the jar half full?
2. At what time was there only one cell in the jar? (By the way, half cells don't count!)

Answer 3

well cells take 13 days to divid. if they divid every minutes you will be huge. first they go threw interphase then mitosois the cytokinese

Answer 4

I'd say about 1,00 times, because when 1 cell becomes 2 cells, there are more cells to split

Answer 5

The formula is 2^20 = 1 048 576. Twenty divisions would be sufficient for one cell to produce an organism with over a million cells.

Answer 6

It depends how long the period is between cell divisions. Assuming the period is 30 minutes - and that no cells died... It would take just 5 hours for there to be 1000 cells (actually 1024).

Answer 7

500