Columbia Encyclopedia

Search results

500 results found

Peebles, Phillip James Edwin

(Encyclopedia)Peebles, Phillip James Edwin, 1935–, Canadian-American astrophysicist and cosmologist, b. Winnipeg, Man., Ph.D. Princeton, 1962. He spent his entire career as a researcher at Princeton, becoming a f...

photosphere

(Encyclopedia)photosphere, luminous, apparently opaque layer of gases that forms the visible surface of the sun or any other star. The photosphere lies between the dense interior gases and the more attenuated gases...

Wilkins, Roger

(Encyclopedia)Wilkins, Roger, 1932–2017, American government official, civil-rights activists, journalist, and educator, b. Kansas City, Mo., grad. Univ. of Michigan (B.A., 1953; LL.B. 1956); nephew of Roy Wilkin...

Wertmüller, Lina

(Encyclopedia)Wertmüller, Lina, 1928–2021, Italian film director, b. Archangela as Felice Assunta Wertmüller von Elgg Spañol von Braucich. In the 1970s she becam...

Cancer, in astronomy

(Encyclopedia)Cancer [Lat.,=the crab], in astronomy, constellation lying on the ecliptic (the sun's apparent path through the heavens) between Gemini and Leo; it is a constellation of the zodiac. It contains the st...

celestial pole

(Encyclopedia)celestial pole, one of the two points at which the earth's axis of rotation intersects the celestial sphere. The celestial pole is important as a reference point in the equatorial coordinate system; t...

nebula

(Encyclopedia)nebula nĕbˈyo͝olə [key] [Lat.,=mist], in astronomy, observed manifestation of a collection of highly rarefied gas and dust in interstellar space. Prior to the 1960s this term was also applied to b...

observatory

(Encyclopedia)observatory, scientific facility especially equipped to detect and record naturally occurring scientific phenomena. Although geological and meteorological observatories exist, the term is generally ap...

Libra

(Encyclopedia)Libra lēˈbrə, līˈ– [key] [Lat.,=the scales], southern constellation lying on the ecliptic (the sun's apparent path through the heavens) between Virgo and Scorpius; it is one of the constellatio...

astrolabe

(Encyclopedia)astrolabe ăsˈtrəlāb [key], instrument probably used originally for measuring the altitudes of heavenly bodies and for determining their positions and movements. Although its origin is ancient and ...