standard_description: Use numbers expressed in the form of a single digit times an integer power of 10 to estimate very large or very small quantities, and to express how many times as much one is than the other. For example, estimate the population of the United States as 3 × 108 and the population of the world as 7 × 109, and determine that the world population is more than 20 times larger.
problem_activity: Task
An ant has a mass of approximately $4 \times 10^{−3}$ grams and an elephant has a mass of approximately 8 metric tons.
How many ants does it take to have the same mass as an elephant?
An ant is $10^{−1}$ cm long. If you put all these ants from your answer to part (a) in a line (front to back), how long would the line be? Find two cities in the United States that are a similar distance apart to illustrate this length.
Note: 1 kg = 1000 grams, 1 metric ton = 1000 kg, 1m = 100 cm, 1km = 1000 m


aligns: yes