Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Mathematics/2014 March 2

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March 2

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band aid info

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human body average is 1.9m^2 band aid is 19x79mm how many can you fit on the human body? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 216.124.224.116 (talk) 01:16, 2 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]

There are 1000 mm in 1 m. So in a square meter, there will be 1000 x 1000 square millimeters. See if you can work out the rest from there. —SeekingAnswers (reply) 05:47, 2 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]
The simple calculation assumes that no overlap is allowed and that you are permitted to cut up each band aid into arbitrarily small pieces to cover irregular shapes. It ignores the flexibility of the human skin, so, in practice, perfect coverage cannot be achieved. Dbfirs 07:50, 2 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]
The question did not specify that the human body was a live one. If not, the topological possibilities are broader. --jpgordon::==( o ) 23:46, 4 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Good point, though the skin tends to become less flexible soon after death. (See Codex Alera#Canim) Dbfirs 08:41, 5 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]
1265 band-aids. Th4n3r (talk) 19:40, 6 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]