1. It is expressed as a product of a number between 1 and 10 (inclusive) and a power of 10. This means it will always look like this: *a* x 10^ *b*
* 'a' is a number between 1 and 10 (e.g., 1.23, 5.678, 9.99)
* 'b' is an integer (positive, negative, or zero)
2. It is a shorthand way of representing very large or very small numbers. This is the main reason we use scientific notation - it makes it much easier to work with extremely big or small numbers.
