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McGraw Hill Integrated II, 2012

MH

McGraw Hill Integrated II, 2012 View details

5. Volumes of Pyramids and Cones

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Exercise 44 Page 847

Factor the numerator and denominator as much as you can. Cancel out common factors, if possible.

E

Practice makes perfect

We want to simplify the given rational expression. To do so, we will factor the numerator and denominator as much as possible. Then, we will cancel out any common factors.

x^2-2x-8/x^2+2x

Write as a difference

x^2+2x-4x-8/x^2+2x

Factor out x

x(x+2)-4x-8/x(x+2)

Factor out - 4

x(x+2)-4(x+2)/x(x+2)

Factor out x+2

(x+2)(x-4)/x(x+2)

CancelCommonFac

Cancel out common factors

(x+2)(x-4)/x(x+2)

Simplify quotient

x-4/x

We simplified the expression to x-4x, which corresponds to the answer E.

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Exercises p.844-847