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:
88 x 88 x 88 x 88 x ... (for a total of 78 times) = 46735665116628913054266043853715660039889466835130065166740370950181748948867663588427865785828745137167396576663070589806636094473234812210578041339904
Therefore, 88 to the power of 78 is 46735665116628913054266043853715660039889466835130065166740370950181748948867663588427865785828745137167396576663070589806636094473234812210578041339904.