Columbia Encyclopedia

Search results

500 results found

torsion balance

(Encyclopedia)torsion balance, instrument used to measure small forces. It is based on the principle that a wire or thread resists twisting with a force that is proportional to the stress. The torsion balance consi...

Youngstown

(Encyclopedia)Youngstown, city (1990 pop. 95,732), seat of Mahoning co., NE Ohio, near the Pa. line; founded 1797, inc. 1849. It was formerly a major U.S. iron and steel center. In the 1970s many of the steel mills...

Biot, Jean Baptiste

(Encyclopedia)Biot, Jean Baptiste zhäN bätēstˈ byō [key], 1774–1862, French physicist, grad. École Polytechnique (1797). He taught mathematics at Beauvais before becoming (1800) professor of mathematical ph...

Zhanjiang

(Encyclopedia)Zhanjiang or Chankiang both: jän-jyäng [key], Cantonese Tsamkong, official Chinese name for the former French territory of Kwangchowan (325 sq mi/840 sq km) on Guangzhou Bay, S Guangdong prov., Chin...

marine engine

(Encyclopedia)marine engine, machine for the propulsion of watercraft. The earliest marine power plants, reciprocating steam engines, were used almost exclusively until the early 1900s. In later ship construction t...

musical instruments

(Encyclopedia)musical instruments are classified in various ways, but the system devised in 1914 by Kurt Sachs and E. M. von Hornbostel has been accorded recognition by both anthropologists and musicologists becaus...

typewriter

(Encyclopedia)typewriter, instrument for producing by manual operation characters similar to those of printing. Corresponding to each key on the instrument's keyboard is a steel type. Activated through a series of ...

ampere

(Encyclopedia)ampere ămˈpēr [key], abbr. amp or A, basic unit of electric current. It is the fundamental electrical unit used with the mks system of units of the metric system. The ampere is officially defined a...

Galvani, Luigi

(Encyclopedia)Galvani, Luigi lo͞oēˈjē gälväˈnē [key], 1737–98, Italian physician. He was professor of anatomy from 1775 at the Univ. of Bologna and was noted as a surgeon and for research in comparative a...

Foucault, Jean Bernard Léon

(Encyclopedia)Foucault, Jean Bernard Léon zhäN bĕrnärˈ lāôNˈ fo͞okōˈ [key], 1819–68, French physicist. Known especially for his research on the speed of light, he determined its velocity in air and fou...