Columbia Encyclopedia

Search results

500 results found

Percheron horse

(Encyclopedia)Percheron horse pûrˈchərŏnˌ [key], breed of draft horse developed in NW France, originally of Flemish origin, but also containing some Arabian blood (see Arabian horse). For a heavy horse, it has...

prostatitis

(Encyclopedia)prostatitis prŏsˌtətīˈtĭs [key], inflammation of the prostate gland. Acute prostatitis is usually a result of infection in the urinary tract or infection carried by the blood; in many cases the ...

Pan-Germanism

(Encyclopedia)Pan-Germanism, German nationalist doctrine aiming at the union of all German-speaking peoples under German rule. Pan-Germanists considered that not only the German groups in neighboring countries, suc...

peritoneum

(Encyclopedia)peritoneum pĕrətənēˈəm [key], multilayered membrane which lines the abdominal cavity, and supports and covers the organs within it. The part of the membrane that lines the abdominal cavity is ca...

peritonitis

(Encyclopedia)peritonitis pĕrˌĭtənīˈtĭs [key], acute or chronic inflammation of the peritoneum, the membrane that lines the abdominal cavity and surrounds the internal organs. It is caused by invasion of bac...

Wassermann, August von

(Encyclopedia)Wassermann, August von wŏsˈərmən, Ger. ouˈgo͝ost fən väsˈərmän [key], 1866–1925, German physician and bacteriologist. In Berlin he was director of the department of experimental therapy a...

Brooke, Rupert

(Encyclopedia)Brooke, Rupert, 1887–1915, English poet. At the outbreak of World War I he joined the Royal Naval Division, served at Antwerp, and was in the Dardanelles expedition when he died of blood poisoning a...

Capa, Robert

(Encyclopedia)Capa, Robert kăpˈə [key], 1913–54, American war photographer, b. Hungary as Andre Friedmann. He came to Paris in 1933 and from that time on recorded with profound concern the spectacle of humanit...

molar volume

(Encyclopedia)molar volume, the volume occupied by a mole of a substance at STP. According to Avogadro's law, at a given temperature and pressure a given volume of any gas contains the same number of molecules. At ...

Lobengula

(Encyclopedia)Lobengula lōˌbĕng-go͞oˈlə [key], c.1833–94, king of Matabeleland (now in Zimbabwe). After succeeding his father (1870), he tried to turn aside the approaches of European colonizers. In 1888, h...

Browse by Subject