The population of a bacteria in a Petri dish doubles every 24 hours. The population of the bacteria is initially 500 organisms. How long will it take for the population of the bacteria to reach 800.
Let's call the time it takes for the population to reach 800 "t" hours.
Since the population of the bacteria doubles every 24 hours, after t hours, the population will be 500 * (2^(t/24)).
We want to solve the equation 500 * (2^(t/24)) = 800.
Divide both sides by 500 to get 2^(t/24) = 1.6.
Take the logarithm of both sides to get t/24 = log2(1.6).
Multiply both sides by 24 to get t = 24 * log2(1.6).
Using a calculator, we find that log2(1.6) is approximately 0.678, so t ≈ 24 * 0.678.
Therefore, it will take approximately 16.27 hours for the population of the bacteria to reach 800 organisms.