The first step is to understand what it means when a number has an exponent. The “power” of a number indicates how many times the base would be multiplied by itself to reach the correct value.
The second step is to write the number in the base-exponent form, and lastly calculate what the final result would be. Consider the example of 2 to the power of 4: in exponent form that would be
So re-applying these steps to our particular problem, we first convert our word problem to a base-exponent form of:
To simplify this, all that is needed is to multiply it out:
72 x 72 x 72 x 72 x ... (for a total of 82 times) = 200108117945526845221496153664777552832850086532596403226393514057481879717565311234068520219105244840055721096549456290429043777402360083285029980995584
Therefore, 72 to the power of 82 is 200108117945526845221496153664777552832850086532596403226393514057481879717565311234068520219105244840055721096549456290429043777402360083285029980995584.