edited by
~ o O'Connor d Texas ABM University College Station, TX 77843
Mathematical problems and theoretical questions relating to practical applications will tingle your brains and those of your students in this monthly minifeature. Contributions to this feature are welcome and should be addressed to the feature editor.
Gold Mine! Thomas E. Taylor Texas A&M Uniuersity College Station, TX 77843 You can stake out your own private gold mine worth about $163,000 and nobody will try to drive youaway. Your "claim" is simply one cubic mile of ocean. (The value assumes gold is selling a t about $400 per troy ounce.) From this data calculate the concentration of gold in the ocean in ppm. We recommend t h a t you actually do the calculation before you start rowing out to sea. Answer: 3 X 10-6 ppm (one ppm is a low concentration: this is a uel'y low concentration.) Adapted from Taylor, T. E., Mastery Level problems in "Study Guide for Chemical Principles," Third Edition, Benjamin Cummings, 1979.
Volume 57, Number 9, September 1980 / 665
