QuestionPractice Another Unclogging Arteries Research done in the 1930s by the French physiologist Jean Poiseuille showed that the resistance of a blood vessel of length / and radius is , where is a constant. Suppose a dose of the drug TPA increases by . How will this affect the resistance ? Assume that is constant.
Studdy Solution
STEP 1
What is this asking?
If the radius of a blood vessel increases, how much does the resistance of the blood vessel decrease?
Watch out!
The radius is increasing, so we expect the resistance to *decrease*.
Don't mix up a decrease with an increase!
STEP 2
1. Set up the equation
2. Calculate the new radius
3. Calculate the new resistance
4. Calculate the percent change in resistance
STEP 3
We're given the formula , where is a constant and is also constant.
This tells us how the resistance relates to the radius .
STEP 4
The problem says the drug increases by **8%**.
This means the new radius, let's call it , is the **original radius** plus **8% of** .
STEP 5
Mathematically, we can write this as: So the new radius is **1.08 times** the original radius.
STEP 6
Now, let's find the new resistance, which we'll call .
We can use the same formula, but with the new radius :
STEP 7
We know , so we can substitute that in:
STEP 8
We can rewrite this as:
Notice that is just the original resistance, !
So,
STEP 9
The percent change is calculated as:
STEP 10
In our case, the **new value** is and the **old value** is :
STEP 11
We know , so let's plug that in:
STEP 12
The resistance decreases by approximately **26.5%**.
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