RADICALS
Review of Introductory Mathematics
Changing Exponents to Radicals
How to convert radicals into exponential form has been explained. Sometimes however, it is
necessary or convenient to convert exponents to radicals. Recognizing that an exponent is the
equivalent of the nth root is useful to help comprehend an expression.
The expression
can be written as
. It is algebraically expressed as:
51/3
3
5
a
1
m
m
a
The above definition can be more generally described as:
n
am
(am)
1
n
a
m
n
and
n
b
m
b
1
n
m
b
m
n
Examples:
152/3
3
152
161/2
2
16
4
MA-01
Page 78
Rev. 0
