Columbia Encyclopedia

Search results

500 results found

epilepsy

(Encyclopedia)epilepsy, a chronic disorder of cerebral function characterized by periodic convulsive seizures. There are many conditions that have epileptic seizures. Sudden discharge of excess electrical activity,...

Berbers

(Encyclopedia)Berbers, aboriginal Caucasoid peoples of N Africa, called Imazighen in the Tamazight language. They inhabit the lands lying between the Sahara and the Mediterranean Sea and between Egypt and the Atlan...

continental drift

(Encyclopedia) CE5 Continental drift (arrows indicate the directions of motion of the landmasses) A. Proposed reconstruction of the supercontinent Pangaea indicating the major present landmasses B. Proposed recon...

polar bear

(Encyclopedia)polar bear, large white bear, Ursus maritimus, formerly Thalarctos maritimus, of the coasts of arctic North America, Asia, and Europe. Polar bears usually live on drifting pack ice, but sometimes wand...

Stassfurt

(Encyclopedia)Stassfurt shtäsˈfo͝ort [key], city (1994 pop. 24,025), Saxony-Anhalt, central Germany. It is a center of one of the world's great potash-mining regions. City manufactures include chemicals, foodstu...

National Petroleum Reserve

(Encyclopedia)National Petroleum Reserve, area, c.23 million acres (9.32 million hectares), Alaska North Slope, situated W of Prudhoe Bay and the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. The reserve, which is the largest r...

Danelaw

(Encyclopedia)Danelaw dānˈlôˌ [key], originally the body of law that prevailed in the part of England occupied by the Danes after the treaty of King Alfred with Guthrum in 886. It soon came to mean also the are...

Salinas, river, United States

(Encyclopedia)Salinas, river, c.150 mi (240 km) long, rising in the Santa Lucia Mts., S Calif., and flowing (partly underground) past King City, Paso Robles, and Salinas, NW to Monterey Bay. The irrigated valley is...

fireweed

(Encyclopedia)fireweed, any of several plants that spring up in fire-swept regions, especially the great willow herb Epilobium, which is classified in the family Onagraceae (evening primrose family). ...

Vescovo, Victor Lance

(Encyclopedia)Vescovo, Victor Lance, 1966–, American private equity investor and adventurer, b. Dallas, Tex., M.B.A. Harvard, 1994. He was a principal at Lehman Brothers (1991–92), a senior manager at Bain and ...
 

Browse by Subject