Columbia Encyclopedia

Search results

454 results found

patina

(Encyclopedia)patina pătˈənə [key], coating of carbonate of copper on articles of copper or bronze, formed after long exposure to a moist atmosphere or burial in the earth. Although commonly green, patina varie...

Foulis, Andrew

(Encyclopedia)Foulis, Andrew foulz [key], 1712–75, and Robert Foulis, 1707–76, Scottish printers, brothers. They worked in partnership as printers to the Univ. of Glasgow. Their publications were famous both fo...

ammonium sulfate

(Encyclopedia)ammonium sulfate, chemical compound, (NH4)2SO4, a colorless-to-gray, rhombohedral crystalline substance that occurs in nature as the mineral mascagnite. It is soluble in water and insoluble in alcohol...

fulminate

(Encyclopedia)fulminate fŭlˈmĭnāt [key], any salt of fulminic acid, HONC, a highly unstable compound known only in solution. The term is most commonly applied to the explosive mercury (II) fulminate, also calle...

White, Stewart Edward

(Encyclopedia)White, Stewart Edward, 1873–1946, American author, b. Grand Rapids, Mich., grad. Univ. of Michigan, 1895. The stories collected in The Claim Jumpers (1901) and The Blazed Trail (1902) reflect his ow...

cerussite

(Encyclopedia)cerussite sērˈəsīt [key], colorless to white or gray mineral, sometimes yellowish or greenish, transparent to opaque, very brittle, crystallizing in the orthorhombic system and occurring also in g...

mimic thrush

(Encyclopedia)mimic thrush, common name for members of the Mimidae, a family of exclusively American birds, allied to the wrens and thrushes, that includes the mockingbird, the catbird, and the thrashers. Mimic thr...

dogfish

(Encyclopedia)dogfish, name for a number of small sharks of several different families. Best known are the spiny dogfishes (family Squalidae) and the smooth dogfishes (family Triakidae). Spiny dogfishes have two sp...

Tillich, Paul Johannes

(Encyclopedia)Tillich, Paul Johannes tĭlˈĭk [key], 1886–1965, American philosopher and theologian, b. Germany, educated at the universities of Berlin, Tübingen, Halle, and Breslau. In 1912 he was ordained a m...

molybdenite

(Encyclopedia)molybdenite məlĭbˈdənīt, mō– [key], a mineral, molybdenum disulfide, MoS2, blue-gray in color, with a metallic luster and greasy feel. It occurs in crystals of the hexagonal system but more co...

Browse by Subject