Question

Which of the terms given below is a like term to $-7a^5{b}^4$?

• A. $-14a^4{b}^5$
• B. $7a^4{b}^4$
• C. $-36a^5{b}^5$
• D. $-81a^5{b}^4$

Answer 1

The correct option is D $-81a^5{b}^4$

$\underset{–}{\text{Like Terms:}}$
Like terms in algebra are the terms which contain the same variables raised to the same power (or exponent).

Given term $=-7a^5{b}^4$
$\bullet$ Variables are $\underset{–}{a}$ and $\underset{–}{b}.$
$\bullet$ Powers of $a$ and $b$ are $\underset{–}{4}$ and $\underset{–}{5}$ respectively.

Now, let's list the variables and their respective powers as depicted in below table,
As per the table, we can clearly observe that $-81a^5{b}^4$ has variables $a$ and $b$ with powers $\underset{–}{5}$ and $\underset{–}{4}$ respectively.

As a result, $\underset{–}{-81a^5{b}^4}$ is the like term to $\underset{–}{-7a^5{b}^4}.$

Therefore, option (d.) is the correct answer.