Columbia Encyclopedia

Search results

500 results found

diatom

(Encyclopedia)diatom dīˈətŏmˌ, –tōmˌ [key], unicellular organism of the kingdom Protista, characterized by a silica shell of often intricate and beautiful sculpturing. Most diatoms exist singly, although s...

fasting

(Encyclopedia)fasting, partial or temporary abstinence from food, a widely used form of asceticism. Among the stricter Jews the principal fast is the Day of Atonement, or Yom Kippur; in Islam the faithful fast all ...

enthalpy

(Encyclopedia)enthalpy ĕnˈthălpē [key], measure of the heat content of a chemical or physical system; it is a quantity derived from the heat and work relations studied in thermodynamics. As a system changes fro...

uric acid

(Encyclopedia)uric acid yo͝orˈĭk [key], white, odorless, tasteless crystalline substance formed as a result of purine degradation in man, other primates, dalmatians, birds, snakes, and lizards. The last three gr...

quasar

(Encyclopedia)quasar kwāˈsär [key], one of a class of blue celestial objects having the appearance of stars when viewed through a telescope and currently believed to be the most distant and most luminous objects...

Ohio Company of Associates

(Encyclopedia)Ohio Company of Associates, organization for the purchase and settlement of lands on the Ohio River, founded at Boston in 1786. Its organizers were a group of New England men, most of them former Amer...

panda

(Encyclopedia)panda, name for two unrelated nocturnal Asian mammals of the order Carnivora, red pandas, genus Ailurus, and the giant panda, Ailuropoda melanoleuca. Red pandas, also known as lesser pandas and cat be...

Hume, David

(Encyclopedia)Hume, David hyo͞om [key], 1711–76, Scottish philosopher and historian. Educated at Edinburgh, he lived (1734–37) in France, where he finished his first philosophical work, A Treatise of Human Nat...

Jacobs, Jane

(Encyclopedia)Jacobs, Jane, 1916–2006, American-Canadian urbanologist, b. Scranton, Pa., as Jane Butzner. She moved to New York City in the 1930s, was an editor (1952–64) of Architectural Forum magazine, and wr...

Duns Scotus, John

(Encyclopedia)Duns Scotus, John dŭnz skōˈtəs [key] [Lat. Scotus=Irishman or Scot], c.1266–1308, scholastic philosopher and theologian, called the Subtle Doctor. A native of Scotland, he became a Franciscan an...