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fusion

(Encyclopedia)fusion, in physics. 1 The change of a substance from the solid to the liquid state, also known as melting. The heat given up by a unit mass of a substance during fusion is called the latent heat of fu...

Bikini

(Encyclopedia)Bikini bēkēˈnē [key], atoll, c.2 sq mi (5.2 sq km), W central Pacific, one of the Ralik Chain, Marshall Islands. It comprises 36 islets on a reef 25 mi (40 km) long. After its inhabitants were rem...

butoh

(Encyclopedia)butoh [Jap.,=dance of darkness], avant-garde dance form developed in post–World War II Japan. First performed in 1959 by the dancers Tatsumi Hijikata (1928–86) and Kazuo Ohno (1906–2010), butoh ...

Bohr, Niels Henrik David

(Encyclopedia)Bohr, Niels Henrik David bōr [key], 1885–1962, Danish physicist, one of the foremost scientists of modern physics. He studied at the Univ. of Copenhagen (Ph.D. 1911) and carried on research on the...

isotope

(Encyclopedia)CE5 Isotopes of hydrogen isotope īˈsətōp [key], in chemistry and physics, one of two or more atoms having the same atomic number but differing in atomic weight and mass number. The concept of ...

Seaborg, Glenn Theodore

(Encyclopedia)Seaborg, Glenn Theodore sēˈbôrg [key], 1912–99, American chemist, b. Ishpeming, Mich., grad. Univ. of California at Los Angeles, 1934, Ph.D. Univ. of California at Berkeley, 1937. In 1939, he beg...

Kitakyushu

(Encyclopedia)Kitakyushu kētäˈkyo͞osho͞o [key], city (1990 pop. 1,026,455), Fukuoka prefecture, N Kyushu, Japan, on the Shimonoseki Strait between the Inland Sea and the Korea Strait. It was formed in 1963 by ...

Alamogordo

(Encyclopedia)Alamogordo ălˌəməgôrˈdō, –də [key], city, seat of Otero co., S N.Mex., near the Sacramento Mts.; inc. 1912. Holloman Air Force Base, home to U.S. stealth aircraf...

Wheeler, John Archibald

(Encyclopedia)Wheeler, John Archibald, 1911–2008, American physicist and educator, b. Jacksonville, Fla. Educated at Johns Hopkins (Ph.D., 1933), he joined the faculty at Princeton in 1938, and after 1976 was dir...

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