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preposition

(Encyclopedia)preposition, in English, the part of speech embracing a small number of words used before nouns and pronouns to connect them to the preceding material, e.g., of, in, and about. Prepositions are a clas...

Babbitt metal

(Encyclopedia)Babbitt metal, an antifriction metal first produced by Isaac Babbitt in 1839. In present-day usage the term is applied to a whole class of silver-white bearing metals, or “white metals.” These all...

Hodgkin, Dorothy Mary Crowfoot

(Encyclopedia)Hodgkin, Dorothy Mary Crowfoot, 1910–94, English chemist and X-ray crystallographer, b. Egypt. She received the 1964 Nobel Prize in chemistry for determining the structure of biochemical compounds (...

septic tank

(Encyclopedia)septic tank, underground sedimentation tank in which sewage is retained for a short period while it is decomposed and purified by bacterial action. The organic matter in the sewage settles to the bott...

Franklin, Rosalind Elsie

(Encyclopedia)Franklin, Rosalind Elsie, 1920–58, English molecular biologist and chemist, grad. Newnham College, Cambridge (1941). She spent most of the war years (1942–45) working for the British Coal Utilisat...

Wilkins, Maurice Hugh Frederick

(Encyclopedia)Wilkins, Maurice Hugh Frederick, 1916–2004, British biophysicist, b. New Zealand, Ph.D. Univ. of Birmingham, 1940. He conducted research at the Univ. of St. Andrews, Scotland, and at Kings College, ...

Sarpsborg

(Encyclopedia)Sarpsborg särpsˈbôr [key], city (1995 pop. 46,474), Ostfold co., SE Norway, a port on the Glåma River near its mouth in the Oslofjord. Manufactures include forest products, chemicals, textiles, an...

Barry, Sir Charles

(Encyclopedia)Barry, Sir Charles, 1795–1860, English architect. A leader in the revival of the Renaissance style of architecture in England (also called Anglo-Italian), he designed the Travellers Club and the Ref...

chloroprene

(Encyclopedia)chloroprene klōrˈəprēnˌ [key] or 2-chloro-1,3-butadiene, colorless liquid organic compound used in the synthesis of neoprene and certain other rubbers. The structure of the chloroprene molecule i...

choragic monuments

(Encyclopedia)choragic monuments kərăjˈĭk, –rājˈ–, kō– [key] [Gr.,=of the choragus, the chorus leader], small decorative structures erected in ancient Greece to commemorate the victory of the leader of...