It was the end; coma was coming; the mind was departing with the breath. The Three Cities Trilogy, Complete Emile Zola It was not long before they were reduced to a coma of hunger.
An exponent is a quantity representing the power to which some other quantity is raised. Exponents do not have to be numbers or constants; they can be variables. They are often positive whole number s, but they can be negative number s, fractional number s, irrational number s, or complex number s.
In other words, when you have a rational exponent, the denominator of that exponent is your index or root number and the numerator of the exponent is the exponential part. I have found it easier to think of it in two parts. Find the root part first and then take it to the exponential part if possible.