Hey there, thanks for posting your first question!
If you're asked to factor a polynomial, you need to look for the
greatest common factor between the terms that are involved.
The greatest common factor of 16a and 72 is 8 because 8
is the largest number that can divide into both 16 and 72.
The "a" doesn't qualify because it doesn't appear in every term.
So the 8 factors out.
When that happens, we are left with each term divided by that 8
inside a set of parenthses, I'll show you what I mean.
So we have 8(2a + 9).
I divided the 16a by the 8 and 72 by the 8 and if you
distribute it back you will end up with the original polynomial.
So our answer 8(2a + 9).