Question

How do you add `(12a^5 - 6a - 10a^3) - (10a - 2a^5 - 14a^4)`?

Answer 1

`14a^5+14a^4-10a^3-16a`

Explanation:

All you have to do is distribute the negative through the second half of the equation `-(10a-2a^5-14a^4)` to get `-10a+2a^5+14a^4`.

Rewriting your equation you get `12a^5-6a-10a^3-10a+2a^5+14a^4`

Now you can look to see if you can combine like terms, i.e. terms that have the same degree of "a" in them.

`12a^5` and `2a^5` are like terms. `-6a` and `-10a` are also like terms. The other two terms cannot combine with anything as they share no like terms.

The final answer, after adding up the like terms, is `14a^5+14a^4-10a^3-16a`