Normalized number

In applied mathematics, a number is normalized when it is written in scientific notation with one nonzero decimal digit before the decimal point. Thus, a real number when written out in normalized scientific notation is as follows:

where n is an integer, , ... are the digits of the number in base 10, and is not zero. That is, its leading digit (i.e. leftmost) is not zero and is followed by the decimal point. This is the standard form of scientific notation. An alternative style is to have the first non-zero digit after the decimal point.