EUCLIDEAN ALGORITHM is an efficient method for computing the greatest common factor (GCF) of

two numbers, the largest number that divides both of them without leaving a remainder.
-It can be used to reduce fractions to their simplest form.

Problem: Find the greatest common factor of 15 and 40 using the Euclidean Algorithm.

In Step 1, we divided 40 by 15, got a quotient of 2 and a remainder of 10.

In Step 2, the divisor 15 in the previous step (Step 1) became the dividend. The remainder 10 in the
previous step became the divisor. In the calculation, we got a quotient of 1 and a remainder of 5.
In Step 3, the divisor 10 in the previous step (Step 2) became the dividend. The remainder 5 in the
previous step became the divisor. We got a quotient of 2 and a remainder of 0.

Once the remainder in the algorithm becomes 0, the remainder in the previous step is the greatest
common factor of the two numbers. In this case, the remainder is the previous step is 5, so the
greatest common factor of 15 and 40 is 5.

As we can see from above, the Euclidean algorithm is repeated division such that in each step, the
divisor is the remainder from the previous step and the dividend is the divisor from the previous step.