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Amorphous Solid, Amorphous semiconductors in electronics

2005-03-24T08:22:00.000-08:00

Amorphous semiconductors, in the form of thin films prepared by methods such as that shown in Figure 4D, are important in applications requiring large areas of electronically active material. The first electronic application of amorphous semiconductors to occur on a large scale was

Smith Sound

2005-03-21T16:44:00.000-08:00

The sound was discovered in 1616 by William Baffin and named for Sir Thomas Smythe (Smith), promoter of voyages to find a Northwest Passage. It was not until the mid-19th century that any explorer reached

Holcroft, Thomas

2005-03-20T00:56:00.000-08:00

The son of a peddler, Holcroft worked as a stableboy, cobbler, and teacher before he was able to make his living as a writer. He is remembered for his melodrama The Road to Ruin (performed 1792, often revived); his translation of Beaumarchais's play Le Mariage de Figaro (Paris, 1784) under the title The Follies

Water Cock

2005-03-18T18:57:00.000-08:00

(Gallicrex cinerea), marsh bird of the rail family, Rallidae (order Gruiformes). It occurs from India to Japan and throughout Southeast Asia to the Philippines. The male is blue-black with red legs, a strongly conical red bill, and a protruding red frontal shield. The female is mottled and barred yellowish brown. The water cock is troublesome in rice fields, where it likes

Pavese, Cesare

2005-03-16T16:15:00.000-08:00

Born in a small town in which his father, an official, owned property, he moved with his family to Turin, where he attended high school and the university. Denied an outlet for his creative powers by Fascist control of literature,

Hammar, Lake

2005-03-14T04:47:00.000-08:00

Arabic Hawr Al-hammar, large swampy lake in southeastern Iraq, south of the junction of the Tigris and Euphrates rivers. Fed by distributaries of the Euphrates, the lake (70 miles [110 km] long; 750 square miles [1,950 square km] in area) drains via a short channel into the Shatt al-Arab near Basra. It was once only a reed-filled marshland but was later utilized as a natural irrigation reservoir for the fertile soils

Antarctica, Birds

2005-03-11T13:03:00.000-08:00

About 45 species of birds live south of the Antarctic Convergence, but only three—the emperor penguin (see photograph), Antarctic petrel, and South Polar (McCormick's) skua—breed exclusively on the continent or on nearby islands. An absence of mammalian land predators and the rich offshore food supply make Antarctic coasts a haven for immense seabird

Biblical Literature, The Sadducees

2005-03-10T16:00:00.000-08:00

The Sadducees, more conservative and static, consisted mainly of the old priesthood and landed aristocracy and, perhaps, some Herodians. They were collaborators with Rome. They did not believe in resurrection because they found no Old Testament enunciation of such a doctrine. In a way, they seemed to respect the Pharisees in legal matters; but both the Pharisees—because

Xavier, Saint Francis

2005-03-07T21:06:00.000-08:00

Xavier's eyes, however, were now fixed on a land reached only five years before by Europeans: Japan. His conversations in Malacca with Anjiro, a Japanese deeply interested in Christianity, had shown that this people was cultured and sophisticated, unlike the fishermen he had known in India or the headhunters of the Moluccas. On Aug. 15, 1549, a Portuguese ship bearing Francis,

Fence

2005-03-04T09:08:00.000-08:00

Barrier erected to confine or exclude people or animals, to define boundaries, or to decorate. Timber, earth, stone, and metal are widely used for fencing. Fences of living plants have been made in many places, such as the hedges of Great Britain and continental Europe and the cactus fences of Latin America. In well-timbered country, such as colonial and 19th-century North

Fields, Dorothy

2005-03-01T22:30:00.000-08:00

Fields was the daughter of Lew M. Fields of the vaudeville comedy team of Weber and Fields. After graduating from high school in New York City, she taught drama

Military Aircraft, Transonic flight

2005-02-28T21:55:00.000-08:00

As the first generation of jet fighters entered service, many aerodynamicists and engineers believed supersonic flight a practical impossibility, owing to transonic drag rise or compressibility, which threatened to tear an aircraft apart. Nevertheless, on Oct. 14, 1947, U.S. Air Force Captain Charles Yeager, flying a rocket-powered Bell X-1 launched from the bomb bay of a B-29,

Ashwell, Lena

2005-02-25T04:19:00.000-08:00

Reared and educated in Canada, Ashwell studied music at Lausanne, Switz., and at the Royal Academy of Music, London. Her voice proved

Ksar El-boukhari

2005-02-24T02:11:00.000-08:00

Also called Boghari, town, north-central Algeria. Lying along the Chelif River at the junction of the High Plateau and the Atlas Mountains, the town is almost totally surrounded by wooded mountain ridges. The old walled quarter (ksar) is on a hill, overlooking the modern town. Ksar el-Boukhari is a commercial centre for pastoral peoples of the interior, who trade in wool, livestock, and cereals.

Karate

2005-02-22T00:29:00.000-08:00

Unarmed martial-arts discipline employing kicking, striking, and defensive blocking with arms and legs. Emphasis is on concentrating as much of the body's power as possible at the point and instant of impact. Striking surfaces include the hands (particularly the knuckles and the outer edge), ball of the foot, heel, forearm, knee, and elbow. All are toughened by practice

Cimarron River

2005-02-20T18:42:00.000-08:00

River rising in northeastern New Mexico, U.S., near Capulin Mountain National Monument and flowing 698 mi (1,123 km) to enter the Arkansas River near Tulsa, Okla. From its source, the Cimarron flows east past Black Mesa, a peak 4,973 ft (1,516 m) high, through the northern Oklahoma Panhandle and bends northward through the southeastern corner of Colorado and the southwestern corner of Kansas.

Tolima

2005-02-18T17:47:00.000-08:00

Departamento, central Colombia, extending from the Andean Cordillera (mountains) Central across the Magdalena River valley to the Cordillera Oriental. Created in 1861, it occupies an area of 9,097 square miles (23,562 square km). The department ranks first in Colombia in the production of rice and sesame; other crops grown in Tolima include cotton, coffee, corn (maize), bananas, sugarcane,

Nepos, Cornelius

2005-02-15T15:12:00.000-08:00

Nepos came, like Catullus, from northern Italy. His principal writings were De viris illustribus (“On Famous Men”), comprising brief biographies of distinguished Romans and foreigners; Chronica, which introduced to the Roman reader a Greek invention, the universal

Approximant

2005-02-14T11:56:00.000-08:00

In phonetics, a sound that is produced by bringing one articulator in the vocal tract close to another without, however, causing audible friction (see fricative). Approximants include semivowels, such as the y sound in “yes” or the w sound in “war.”

D'urfey, Thomas

2005-02-12T00:27:00.000-08:00

Patronized by King Charles II, whom he entertained as a jester

Argentina, The economy

2005-02-09T13:43:00.000-08:00

Labour movements are covered in Ronaldo Munck, Ricardo Falcón, and Bernardo Galitelli, Argentina: From Anarchism to Peronism: Workers, Unions, and Politics, 1855–1985 (1987); David Tamarin, The Argentine Labor Movement, 1930–45: A Study in the Origins of Peronism (1985); and Charles Bergquist, Labor in Latin America: Comparative Essays on Chile, Argentina, Venezuela, and Colombia (1986).

Holdenville

2005-02-08T01:11:00.000-08:00

City, seat (1907) of Hughes county, central Oklahoma, U.S. Founded in 1895 and originally called Fentress, the town site was renamed for J.F. Holden, general manager of the Choctaw, Oklahoma and Gulf Railroad. The city lies on the edge of the Greater Seminole Oil Field and is a market centre for locally grown agricultural goods. Lake Holdenville, just outside the city, is a popular recreation

Marginal Efficiency Of Investment

2005-02-06T18:51:00.000-08:00

In economics, expected rates of return on investment as additional units of investment are made under specified conditions and over a stated period of time. A comparison of these rates with the going rate of interest may be used to indicate the profitability of investment. The rate of return is computed as the rate at which the expected stream of future earnings

Pyryatyn

2005-02-03T01:10:00.000-08:00

Russian Piryatin , also spelled Piriatin city and centre of a rayon (sector), Poltava oblast (province), Ukraine, on the Uday River. Pyryatyn dates at least from 1155, when it is first documented, and was incorporated in 1781. Before the Revolution of 1917 it was an administrative centre and later became a railway junction. Today it has varied industries, including furniture, building materials, and foodstuffs. Pop. (1991 est.) 18,300.

Italo-turkish War

2005-02-01T19:07:00.000-08:00

(1911–12), war undertaken by Italy to gain colonies in North Africa by conquering the Turkish provinces of Tripolitana and Cyrenaica (modern Libya). The conflict upset the precarious international balance of power just prior to World War I by revealing the weakness of Turkey and, within Italy, unleashed the nationalist-expansionist sentiment that guided government policy

Jones, Jo

2005-01-30T07:09:00.000-08:00

Jones grew up in Alabama, studied music for 12 years, and became a skilled trumpeter and pianist; he toured with carnivals as a tap dancer as well as an instrumentalist. He played with Southwestern “territory

Farjeon, Eleanor

2005-01-28T09:14:00.000-08:00

The daughter of a British novelist and granddaughter of a U.S. actor, Eleanor Farjeon grew up in the bohemian literary and dramatic circles of London. Attending opera and

Metabolism, The nature of the respiratory chain

2005-01-27T11:52:00.000-08:00

The carriers are NAD+ and, less frequently, NADP+; the flavoproteins FAD and FMN (flavin mononucleotide);

Pien Canal

2005-01-25T08:59:00.000-08:00

Wade-Giles romanization Pien Ho , Pinyin Bian He canal running northwest-southeast through Honan, Anhwei, and Kiangsu provinces of China. In medieval times the name was given to several different canals that connected the Huang Ho (Yellow River), north of Cheng-chou in Honan, with the Huai River, and thus via the old-established Shan-yang Canal to the Yangtze River at Yang-chou, in Kiangsu. The terrain in the region is

Hannibal

2005-01-23T08:04:00.000-08:00

The treaty between Rome and Carthage that was concluded a year after the Battle of Zama frustrated the entire object of Hannibal's life, but his hopes of taking arms once more against Rome lived on. Although accused of having misconducted the war, he was made a suffete (a civil magistrate) in addition to retaining his military command, and as suffete he was able to overthrow

Central African Republic, The struggle for leadership

2005-01-21T09:06:00.000-08:00

Boganda was a Roman Catholic priest, but he left the priesthood and formed the Social Evolution Movement of Black Africa (Mouvement pour l'Evolution Sociale de l'Afrique Noire; MESAN). In 1957 MESAN gained control of the Territorial Assembly, and Boganda became president of the Grand Council of French Equatorial Africa. Boganda hoped that the former French territories

Animal Communication

2005-01-19T17:31:00.000-08:00

The transmission of information from one animal to another by means of sound, visible sign or behaviour, taste or odour, electrical impulse, touch, or a combination of these mediums. In general, communication is employed by animals to attract or repel other individuals of particular groups and to establish and maintain distinct forms of social organization that

Price, Sammy

2005-01-17T06:19:00.000-08:00

Price first toured as a dancer before working in bands in the Southwest and Midwest during the 1920s and '30s. He moved to New York City in 1937, where he became a staff musician

Caucasian Languages, The Lak-Dargin languages

2005-01-15T07:58:00.000-08:00

Lak (also spelled Lakk, with some 100,000 speakers) and Dargin (or Dargwa, with 350,000) are spoken in the central part of Dagestan. Both are written languages. The Lak language is quite homogeneous with regard to its dialects; Dargin, however, possesses several diversified dialects—sometimes considered as separate languages (e.g., Kubachi). Some view Lak and Dargin as independent language

Xylem

2005-01-12T16:25:00.000-08:00

In botany, part of the vascular system that conveys water and dissolved minerals from the roots to the rest of the plant and may also furnish mechanical support. Xylem consists of specialized water-conducting tissues made up mostly of narrow, elongated, hollow cells. These cells may be of several types, including tracheids (the basic cell type), vessel members, fibres,

Wupatki National Monument

2005-01-10T19:09:00.000-08:00

The monument comprises more than 800 pre-Columbian

Amitabha

2005-01-09T11:08:00.000-08:00

Japanese Amida , Chinese O-mi-t'o in Buddhism, the great saviour deity worshiped principally by members of the Pure Land sect in Japan. As related in the Sukhavati-vyuha-sutra (the fundamental scripture of the Pure Land sects), many ages ago a monk named Dharmakara made a number of vows, the 18th of which promised that, on his attaining buddhahood, all who believed in him and who called upon his name would be born

Aerospace Industry, Periodicals

2005-01-07T01:50:00.000-08:00

The best reference work for aircraft production data on types produced is Jane's All the World's Aircraft (annual). The best reference work on space hardware produced, the space industry, and space-related organizations is Jane's Space Directory (annual). Aerospace Facts and Figures (annual), prepared by the Aerospace Industries Association of America (AIA), is a standard reference source for figures on the American aerospace industry. Aerospace Yearbook (1919–70), compiled by the AIA and its predecessors, is a standard reference source on the U.S aerospace industry to 1970. Aviation Week & Space Technology (weekly) is the best source for the latest information on the aerospace industry. Space News (weekly) covers the business news of the space industry. Flight International (weekly) is an aerospace news magazine published in the United Kingdom. An informative German-language aerospace magazine is Flug Revue (monthly).

Racine, Jean

2005-01-04T08:13:00.000-08:00

The classic biography is Raymond Picard, La Carrière de Jean Racine, new ed. rev. and augmented (1961). Geoffrey Brereton, Jean Racine: A Critical Biography (1951, reprinted 1973), is also worth consulting. A popularized treatment is Alain Viala, Racine: la stratégie du caméléon (1990). Racine's central place in the history of French tragedy is discussed in Jacques Truchet, La Tragédie classique en France (1975). Critical studies accessible to the general reader include John C. Lapp, Aspects of Racinian Tragedy (1955, reissued 1978); Odette de Mourgues, Racine; or, The Triumph of Relevance (1967); Claude Abraham, Jean Racine (1977); David Maskell, Racine: A Theatrical Reading (1991); Edward Forman (ed.), Racine: Appraisal and Reappraisal (1991); Richard Parish, Racine: The Limits of Tragedy (1993); Henry Phillips, Racine: Language and Theatre (1994); and Derval Conroy and Edric Caldicott, Racine: The Power and the Pleasure (2001). The most controversial interpretations of Racine (anthropological by Roland Barthes, Marxist by Lucien Goldmann, and psychoanalytical by Charles Mauron) are reviewed with many others by Jean Rohou, Jean Racine: bilan critique, ed. by Alain Pagès (1994). Roy C. Knight, Racine et la Grèce, 2nd ed. (1974); and Ronald W. Tobin, Racine and Seneca (1971), elucidate Racine's vast knowledge of Greco-Roman antiquity. The rhetoric of the plays has been studied by Michael Hawcrowft, Word as Action: Racine, Rhetoric, and Theatrical Language (1992).

Exuma Cays

2005-01-03T18:45:00.000-08:00

Group of some 365 cays and islands, part of the Bahama Islands, situated in the Atlantic Ocean. The Exuma Cays begin some 35 miles (56 km) east-southeast of Nassau, stretch southeast in a gently curving arc for about 90 miles (145 km), and have an area of 112 square miles (290 square km). Most of the inhabitants live on the islands of Great Exuma and Little Exuma. The Exuma Cays Land and Sea Park, which includes

Vaitown

2004-12-31T01:24:00.000-08:00

Also called Bomi Hills, city, western Liberia, West Africa. Located in the Bomi Hills former iron-mining district, it is associated with the Liberian Mining Company (LMC; a subsidiary of Republic Steel Corporation), which closed down mining operations in the late 1970s. The firm, first in Liberia to export iron ore, completed a 43-mile (69-kilometre) narrow-gauge railway to the port at Monrovia in 1951. Iron interests

Tippecanoe River

2004-12-30T16:40:00.000-08:00

River rising in Tippecanoe Lake in Kosciusko county, northern Indiana, U.S. The river flows 166 miles (267 km) generally southwest into the Wabash River north of Lafayette. Tippecanoe is probably derived from the Miami Indian name for buffalo fish. Between the towns of Buffalo and Brookston on the river's lower course, Lakes Shafer and Freeman are impounded by power dams. At

Houssay, Bernardo Alberto

2004-12-27T09:28:00.000-08:00

Working with dogs that had been rendered diabetic by excision of the pancreas (1924–37), Houssay found that removal

Zond

2004-12-25T13:19:00.000-08:00

Any of a series of eight unmanned Soviet lunar and interplanetary probes. Zond 1 (launched April 1964) and Zond 2 (November 1964) were aimed at Venus and Mars respectively, but failed to send back data on the planets. Zond 3 (July 1965) transmitted closeup photographs of 3,000,000 square miles (7,800,000 square kilometres) of the lunar surface, including the hidden side, before going into solar orbit. Zond 5 (September

Berenice

2004-12-22T03:28:00.000-08:00

The eldest daughter of Herod Agrippa I by his wife Cypros, Berenice was married at a young age to Marcus, the son of Alexander the Alabarch. Before consummating the marriage, Marcus died, and Berenice then married Herod, king of Chalcis, with whom she had two sons. Following

Mcluhan, Marshall

2004-12-20T17:12:00.000-08:00

In full Herbert Marshall McLuhan Canadian communications theorist and educator, whose aphorism “the medium is the message” summarized his view of the potent influence of television, computers, and other electronic disseminators of information in shaping styles of thinking and thought, whether in sociology, art, science, or religion. He regarded

Learning

2004-12-18T04:51:00.000-08:00

The alteration of behaviour as a result of individual experience. When an organism can perceive and change its behaviour, it is said to learn.

Musical Notation, Alphabetical notations

2004-12-16T06:22:00.000-08:00

Alphabets are historically a phenomenon of the Middle East, Europe, and the Indian subcontinent. Their ordering of letters provides a convenient reference system for the notes of musical scales in ascending or descending order. Alphabetical notations are among the most ancient musical scripts. Two Greek notations were of this type, the earlier using an archaic

Cheever, Ezekiel

2004-12-13T10:14:00.000-08:00

Cheever was the son of a weaver and was educated at Christ's Hospital in London and in the classics at the University of Cambridge. Cheever came to America in 1637 as a Puritan in search of religious freedom. In 1638 he settled in New Haven, Conn., as master of the public school. Active in both civil

Daniel Of Kiev

2004-12-11T10:24:00.000-08:00

Also called Daniel The Pilgrim, Russian Daniil Kievsky, or Daniil Polomnik the earliest known Russian travel writer, whose account of his pilgrimage to the Holy Land is the earliest surviving record in Russian of such a trip. Abbot of a Russian monastery, he visited Palestine probably during 1106–07. His narrative begins at Constantinople; from there he traveled along the west and south coasts of Asia Minor to Cyprus and the Holy Land. Despite his

Sucker

2004-12-10T15:21:00.000-08:00

Any of the freshwater fishes constituting the family Catostomidae, similar to and closely related to the carp and minnows (Cyprinidae). There are about 80 to 100 species of suckers; except for a few species in Asia, all are North American. Many suckers are almost indistinguishable from minnows, but catostomids may often be recognized by the sucking, usually ventral

Epigraphy

2004-12-07T21:03:00.000-08:00

Because such media were exclusive or predominant in many of mankind's earliest civilizations, epigraphy is a prime tool in recovering much of the firsthand record of antiquity. It is thus an essential

Saarland

2004-12-05T13:58:00.000-08:00

Also called Saar, Land (state) in the southwestern portion of Germany. It is bounded by France on the south, Luxembourg on the west, and the Land of Rhineland-Palatinate on the north and east. It covers an area of 992 square miles (2,569 square km). The capital is Saarbrücken, which lies along the Saar River.

Mercier, Louis-sébastien

2004-12-03T11:04:00.000-08:00

One of the first French writers of drame bourgeois (middle-class drama). In Du théâtre (1773; “About the Theatre”), he emphasized the didactic function of the theatre, and in his plays he presented a thesis, subordinating dramatic considerations to the didactic end. He criticized traditional French tragedy as artificial and sterile, though he

Kweichow, Education

2004-12-02T22:49:00.000-08:00

Kweichow has one of the highest rates of illiteracy in China, especially among its many minority peoples. Nonetheless, there are a number of institutions of higher learning in the province, including Kweichow University, Kuei-yang Medical College, Kweichow Agricultural Institute (founded in 1939), the Kuei-yang Nationalities Institute (for training members of ethnic

Møn

2004-11-30T20:12:00.000-08:00

English Moen island, Storstrøm amtskommune (county commune), Denmark. The island has an area of 84 square miles (218 square km) and lies in the Baltic Sea. It is separated from southern Sjælland (Zealand) by the Ulv Strait and from Falster Island by the Grøn Strait. It is primarily flat except on the east coast, where white chalk cliffs covered with beech forests rise above 450 feet (137 m) in places. The

Wells, Emmeline Blanche Woodward

2004-11-27T13:40:00.000-08:00

Emmeline Woodward followed her widowed mother in converting to Mormonism in 1842. She moved with her first husband to the Mormon settlement of Nauvoo, Illinois,

Philippines, Relief and drainage

2004-11-25T20:12:00.000-08:00

The irregular configuration of the archipelago, the coastline of more than 21,500 miles, the great extent of mountainous country, the narrow and interrupted coastal plains, the generally northward trend of the river systems, and the lakes are the outstanding physical features of the Philippines. The islands are composed of volcanic, coral, and all principal rock formations.

Hawkesbury River

2004-11-24T02:16:00.000-08:00

River rising in the Great Dividing Range north of Lake George, New South Wales, Australia, and flowing 293 miles (472 km) north and east to the Tasman Sea at Broken Bay. It drains an area of about 8,390 square miles (21,730 square km). Known as the Wollondilly in its rugged upper course and as the Warragamba after receiving the Nattai and, later, the Nepean rivers, it becomes the Hawkesbury after

Abel, John Jacob

2004-11-22T04:49:00.000-08:00

Abel taught at the University of Michigan, Ann

Arnulf Of Chocques

2004-11-19T09:21:00.000-08:00

Also called Arnulf Malecorne Latin patriarch of Jerusalem in 1099 and again from 1112 until his death. Accompanying the First Crusade as chaplain to Robert I, duke of Normandy, Arnulf won fame as a preacher. Elected patriarch on August 1, 1099, he forced all local Christians to conform with the Latin rite. After Christmas 1099 he was superseded as patriarch by the papal legate Daimbert. During his second term he worked

Sea Lily

2004-11-18T13:49:00.000-08:00

Sea lilies occur chiefly in deep waters, where they feed

Procedural Law, Common law

2004-11-16T02:40:00.000-08:00

In Anglo-American legal systems, a convicted defendant may move in the trial court to arrest judgment, or he may file a motion for a new trial. The legality of the conviction may also be challenged by appeal to a higher court. Criminal appeals were unknown in the traditional common law, but today they are universally granted by statute. In the United Kingdom, the Criminal

China

2004-11-14T19:55:00.000-08:00

On Oct. 1, 1999, Pres. Jiang Zemin and leaders of the Communist Party of China (CPC) celebrated the 50th anniversary of communist rule in China with a massive military parade through downtown Beijing. When Mao Zedong had proclaimed the establishment of the People's Republic of China (PRC) half a century earlier, China was just emerging from a long and bloody civil war. Few observers

Medicine, Britain

2004-11-11T01:00:00.000-08:00

Public health services in Britain are organized locally under the National Health Service. The medical officer of health is employed by the local council and is the adviser in health matters. The larger councils employ a number of mostly full-time medical officers; in some rural areas, a general practitioner may be employed part-time as medical officer of

Quince

2004-11-09T15:53:00.000-08:00

Fruit tree of the genus Cydonia, of the rose family (Rosaceae). The much-branched shrubs or small trees have entire leaves with small stipules and bear large, solitary, white or pink flowers like those of the pear or apple but with leafy calyx lobes and a many-celled ovary, in each cell of which are numerous horizontal ovules. The fruits may be round and flattened or somewhat

Hesperus

2004-11-07T23:03:00.000-08:00

Greek Hesperos, also called Vesper, in Greco-Roman mythology, the evening star, son or brother of Atlas. He was later identified with the morning star, Phosphorus, or Eosphorus (Latin: Lucifer), the bringer of light. Hesperus is variously described by different authors as the father of the Hesperides (the guardians of the golden apples) or of their mother, Hesperis.

Cozumel

2004-11-05T19:28:00.000-08:00

Island, Caribbean Sea, approximately 10 mi (16 km) off the eastern coast of the Yucatán Peninsula, Mexico, in the jurisdiction of Quintana Roo territory. With a total area of 189 sq mi (489 sq km), and measuring 29 mi (46 km) from northeast to southwest and averaging 9 mi (14 km) in width, it is the largest of the islands off the peninsula. Geologically similar to the peninsula, Cozumel is a plain broken

Cozumel

2004-11-04T13:36:00.000-08:00

Usually about 18 metres (60 feet) tall but occasionally reaching 40 m, the tree has ovate, dark-green, sharp-pointed leaves about 10 centimetres long. The bark, brown at first, whitens and peels into paper-thin layers, marked by narrow horizontal pores, or lenticels. On the copper-coloured

Chattanooga

2004-11-02T01:26:00.000-08:00

The site was settled about 1815 when John

Stratemeyer, Edward

2004-10-30T15:24:00.000-07:00

Stratemeyer worked as a store clerk and, on the side, began writing stories in imitation of those of Horatio

Fichtel Hills

2004-10-29T03:30:00.000-07:00

German Fichtelgebirge , Czech Smrciny mountains in northeastern Bavaria Land (state), southeastern Germany. They lie at the Czech border between the Franconian Forest in the northwest, the Ore Mountains (in German, Erzgebirge; in Czech, Krušné Hory) in the northeast, and the Upper Palatinate Forest (a section of the Bohemian Forest) in the south. The rectangular plateau of the Fichtel Hills forms a watershed

Palembang

2004-10-26T22:11:00.000-07:00

Kotamadya (municipality) and capital, Sumatera Selatan provinsi (“province”), Indonesia. It lies on both banks of the Musi River, there spanned by the Ampera Bridge. Sumatra's second largest city (after Medan), it was long the chief town of the Palembang sultanate. The city served as the capital of the Buddhist Srivijaya empire from the 7th century until the kingdom was overthrown

Gyumri

2004-10-25T19:26:00.000-07:00

Also spelled Kumayri , (1924–90) Leninakan , or (until 1924) Alexandropol city, western Armenia. It is believed to have been founded by the Greeks in 401 BC, but it did not have a continuous existence. A fortress was constructed on the site by the Russians in 1837, and in 1840 the town of Alexandropol was founded nearby. Alexandropol was a trading and administrative centre but subsequently underwent industrial development and was renamed Leninakan for

Earth Sciences, The origin of the Nile

2004-10-22T04:43:00.000-07:00

Speculations on the strange behaviour of the Nile were many, varied, and mostly wrong. Thales suggested that the strong

Brod, Max

2004-10-21T20:00:00.000-07:00

Brod studied law at the University of Prague, and in 1902 he met and befriended Kafka. Brod later worked as a minor government

Earth Sciences, Ore deposits and mineralogy

2004-10-19T03:44:00.000-07:00

The German scientist Georgius Agricola has with much justification been called the father of mineralogy. Of his seven geologic books, De natura fossilium (1546; “On Natural

Quinceañera

2004-10-17T22:55:00.000-07:00

Also called quince años Mexican celebration of a girl's 15th birthday, marking her passage from childhood to adulthood. The traditional quinceañera is both a religious and a social event that emphasizes the importance of the family and society in the life of young people. The celebration begins with a mass attended by the girl and her family and godparents. This is followed by a reception,

Oberfranken

2004-10-15T13:00:00.000-07:00

English Upper Franconia Regierungsbezirk (administrative district), northeastern Bavaria Land (state), east-central Germany. Oberfranken is bordered by Thuringia and Saxony Länder to the north, the Czech Republic to the east, and the Regierungsbezirke of Oberpfalz (Upper Palatinate) to the southeast, Mittelfranken (Middle Franconia) to the south, and Unterfranken (Lower Franconia) to the

Saptamatrka

2004-10-13T20:57:00.000-07:00

Representations of the goddesses are found in shrines throughout

Packing

2004-10-10T04:15:00.000-07:00

In mathematics, a type of problem in combinatorial geometry that involves placement of figures of a given size or shape within another given figure—with greatest economy or subject to some other restriction. The problem of placement of a given number of spheres within a given volume of space is an example of a packing problem.

Pan-germanism

2004-10-08T09:52:00.000-07:00

German Pangermanismus or Alldeutschtum movement whose goal was the political unification of all people speaking German or a Germanic language. Some of its adherents favoured the unification of only the German-speaking people of central and eastern Europe and the Low Countries (Dutch and Flemish being regarded as Germanic dialects). The movement had its roots in the desire for German unification stimulated

Extermination Camp

2004-10-06T18:15:00.000-07:00

The major camps were in German-occupied

Mittelland Canal

2004-10-05T05:23:00.000-07:00

Also called Ems-weser-elbe Canal, German waterway begun in 1905 and completed in 1938. It extends from the Dortmund-Ems Canal east of Rheine, Ger., eastward along the northern border of the Central Uplands, to the Elbe River north of Magdeburg (a distance of about 199 miles [321 km]), linking there with the Havel Canal eastward to Berlin. Side canals connect it with Osnabrück, Hannover, Salzgitter, and Hildesheim. Peine, between

Altis

2004-10-02T01:45:00.000-07:00

In Greek religion, the sacred grove of Zeus, or the sacred precinct in Olympia, Greece. It was an irregular quadrangular area more than 200 yards (183 m) on each side, and walled except to the north, where it was bounded by the Kronion (hill of Cronus). In it were the temples of Zeus and of Hera, his consort; the principal altars and votive offerings; the small treasuries built by various

Christianity, Moral arguments

2004-10-01T04:17:00.000-07:00

Moral theistic argument belongs primarily to the modern world and perhaps reflects the modern lack of confidence in metaphysical constructions. Kant, having rejected the cosmological, ontological, and design proofs, argued in the Critique of Practical Reason (1788) that the existence of God, though not directly provable, is a necessary postulate of the moral life. To

Caoshu

2004-09-28T20:29:00.000-07:00

Wade-Giles romanization ts'ao-shu in Chinese calligraphy, a cursive variant of the standard Chinese scripts lishu and kaishu and their semicursive derivative xingshu. The script developed during the Han dynasty (206 BC–AD 220), and it had its period of greatest growth during the Tang dynasty (618–907). In caoshu the number of strokes in characters are reduced to single scrawls or abstract abbreviations of curves and dots.

Turkic Languages

2004-09-26T22:18:00.000-07:00

Group of closely related languages that form a subfamily of the Altaic languages. The Turkic languages show close similarities to each other in phonology, morphology, and syntax, though Chuvash, Khalaj, and Sakha differ considerably from the rest. The earliest linguistic records are Old Turkic inscriptions, found near the Orhon River in Mongolia and the Yenisey

Seth

2004-09-25T19:12:00.000-07:00

The worship of Seth originally centred at Nubt (Greek Ombos), near modern Tukh, on the western bank of the Nile River. Nubt, with its vast cemetery at nearby Naqadah, was the principal predynastic centre in Upper Egypt. The town lost its preeminent position with the unification of Egypt about 3050 BC, which was carried

Shun-chih

2004-09-23T07:10:00.000-07:00

The ninth son of Abahai (1592–1643), the great ruler of the Manchu kingdom of Manchuria, he succeeded to the throne in 1643 at the age of six and ruled under the regency of Dorgon (1612–50), a paternal uncle. In 1644, Manchu troops under Dorgon's command captured Peking, the former capital of the Ming dynasty (1368–1644), and the young ruler

Ch'i

2004-09-20T17:40:00.000-07:00

Neo-Confucian philosophers

Poynings, Sir Edward

2004-09-19T23:40:00.000-07:00

A grandson of William Paston, he was a rebel (1483) against Richard III and attached himself to Henry Tudor, earl of Richmond, who employed

Chase, William Merritt

2004-09-16T09:38:00.000-07:00

Chase studied at the National Academy of Design in New York City and under Karl von Piloty for six years in Munich. He worked for a time in the grays and browns of the Munich school, but in the 1880s

Caroline

2004-09-15T18:31:00.000-07:00

County, eastern Maryland, U.S., lying between the Choptank River and Tuckahoe Creek to the west and Delaware to the east. In addition to the Choptank, it is drained by Marshyhope Creek. Caroline shares Tuckahoe State Park with neighbouring Queen Anne's county. The county was created in 1773 and named for Caroline Eden, a member of the Calvert family and wife of the last colonial

Basellaceae

2004-09-13T00:50:00.000-07:00

The Madeira-vine family of flowering plants in the order Caryophyllales, with 4 genera and 15 to 25 species of herbaceous perennial vines, distributed primarily in the New World tropics. Members of the family have fleshy, untoothed leaves, tuberous rootstocks, and red or white flowers in branched or unbranched clusters. Madeira-vine, or mignonette-vine (Anredera

Refrigeration

2004-09-11T09:30:00.000-07:00

In the industrialized nations and affluent regions in the developing world, refrigeration is chiefly used to store foodstuffs at low temperatures, thus inhibiting the destructive action of bacteria, yeast, and mold. Many perishable products can

Wright, James C(laude), Jr.

2004-09-08T19:01:00.000-07:00

Wright was educated at Weatherford College and the University of Texas before serving in the Army Air Force during World War II. After the war he entered politics as a Democrat

Abdominal Cavity

2004-09-07T14:21:00.000-07:00

Largest hollow space of the body. Its upper boundary is the diaphragm, a sheet of muscle and connective tissue that separates it from the chest cavity; its lower boundary is the upper plane of the pelvic cavity. Vertically it is enclosed by the vertebral column and the abdominal and other muscles. The abdominal cavity contains the

Duricrust

2004-09-05T02:57:00.000-07:00

Surface or near-surface of the Earth consisting of a hardened accumulation of silica (SiO2), alumina (Al2O3), and iron oxide (Fe2O3), in varying proportions. Admixtures of other substances commonly are present and duricrusts may be enriched with oxides of manganese or titanium within restricted areas. Thus, siliceous, ferruginous, and aluminous crusts constitute duricrusts

Gagnoa

2004-09-03T03:49:00.000-07:00

Town, southern Côte d'Ivoire. It is the chief collecting point for a forest region that sends coffee, cocoa, and timber (sipo and mahogany) to the coast for export and is a major market centre (rice, bananas, and yams) for the Bete and Gagu (Gagou) peoples. A paved road connects Gagnoa with Abidjan, the capital of Côte d'Ivoire. The town is the site of the government's first rural technical