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kangaroo rat

(Encyclopedia)kangaroo rat, small, jumping desert rodent, genus Dipodomys, related to the pocket mouse. There are about 20 kangaroo rat species, found throughout the arid regions of Mexico and the S and W United St...

Busan

(Encyclopedia)Busan or Pusan bo͞oˈsän [key], Jap. Fusan, city, extreme SE South Korea, on the Korea Stra...

Windsor, cities, Canada

(Encyclopedia)Windsor wĭnˈzər [key]. 1 Town (1991 pop. 3,625), central N.S., Canada, at the mouth of the Avon River on an arm of Minas Basin. It is the center of a gypsum and limestone-quarrying area. Manufactur...

vortex

(Encyclopedia)vortex vôrˈtĕks [key], mass of fluid in whirling or rotary motion. To simplify the analysis, vortex motion usually describes motions in a frictionless fluid. In such cases the absence of friction w...

Urals

(Encyclopedia)Urals or Ural Mountains, E European Russia and NW Kazakhstan, forming, together with the Ural River, the traditional boundary between Europe and Asia and separating the Russian plain from the W Siberi...

Astoria

(Encyclopedia)Astoria ăstôrˈēə [key]. 1 Commercial, industrial, and residential section of NW Queens borough of New York City, SE N.Y.; settled in the 17th cent. as Hallet's Cove. It was renamed for John Jacob...

kitchen

(Encyclopedia)kitchen, separate room or other space set aside for the cooking or preparation of meals. When cooking first moved indoors, it was performed, with other domestic labors, in the common room, where the f...

Île-de-France, region, France

(Encyclopedia)Île-de-France ēl-də-fräNs [key], region and former province, N central France, in the center of the Paris basin, a fertile depression where the Marne and Ouse rivers join the Seine. Containing par...

Victoria, Lake

(Encyclopedia)Victoria, Lake, or Victoria Nyanza nēănˈzə, nī– [key], largest lake of Africa and the world's second largest freshwater lake, c.26,830 sq mi (69,490 sq km), E central Africa, on the Uganda-Tanz...

Comanche

(Encyclopedia)Comanche kəmănˈchē [key], Native North Americans belonging to the Shoshonean group of the Uto-Aztecan branch of the Aztec-Tanoan linguistic stock (see Native American languages). They originated f...