Columbia Encyclopedia

Search results

500 results found

crane fly

(Encyclopedia)crane fly, true fly resembling a mosquito, often called daddy longlegs because of its six long, delicate legs. (The harvestman, also called daddy longlegs, belongs to an unrelated order.) Most species...

gaillardia

(Encyclopedia)gaillardia gālärˈdēə [key], any plant of the genus Gaillardia of the Asteaceae family (aster family), including annual, biennial, and perennial herbs with showy heads of red and/or yellow ray flo...

mojarra

(Encyclopedia)mojarra mōhärˈə [key], common name for a member of the family Gerreidae, small tropical food fishes. The many American species are found chiefly off the S Atlantic coast but also along the Pacific...

Naberezhnye Chelny

(Encyclopedia)Naberezhnye Chelny nəbĭryĕzhˈēə chĭlnēˈ [key], city (1989 pop. 501,000), in NE European Russia. Once a small town named Chelny, it became Naberezhnye Chelny in 1930. From 1982 to 1988 the cit...

Krasnoyarsk

(Encyclopedia)Krasnoyarsk krəsnəyärskˈ [key], city (1989 pop. 913,000), capital of Krasnoyarsk Territory, W Siberian Russia, on the Yenisei River. A major river port and rail center, it has industries producing...

Kigali

(Encyclopedia)Kigali kēgäˈlē [key], city (1997 pop. 330,000), central Rwanda, capital of Rwanda. It is the country's main administrative and economic center. The city has an international airport and road acces...

Calvin, Melvin

(Encyclopedia)Calvin, Melvin, 1911–97, American organic chemist and educator, b. St. Paul, Minn., grad. Michigan College of Mining and Technology, 1931, Ph.D. Univ. of Minnesota, 1935. In 1937 he joined the facul...

Brown, Robert

(Encyclopedia)Brown, Robert, 1773–1858, Scottish botanist and botanical explorer. In 1801 he went as a naturalist on one of Matthew Flinders's expeditions to Australia, returning (1805) to England with valuable c...

Virgin Islands National Park

(Encyclopedia)Virgin Islands National Park, 14,689 acres (5,949 hectares), St. John, Virgin Islands; est. 1956. The park, with beaches, coves, and headlands, is rich in tropical-plant, animal, and marine life. Bord...

celery

(Encyclopedia)celery, biennial plant (Apium graveolens) of the family Umbelliferae (parsley family), of wide distribution in the wild state throughout the north temperate Old World and much cultivated also in Ameri...