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parent and child

(Encyclopedia)parent and child, legal relationship, created by biological (birth) relationship or by adoption, that confers certain rights and duties on parent and child; in some states the courts have given the no...

accordion

(Encyclopedia) CE5 Accordion accordion, musical instrument consisting of a rectangular bellows expanded and contracted between the hands. Buttons or keys operated by the player open valves, allowing air to enter...

British thermal unit

(Encyclopedia)British thermal unit, abbr. Btu, unit for measuring heat quantity in the customary system of English units of measurement, equal to the amount of heat required to raise the temperature of one pound of...

Knight, Frank Hyneman

(Encyclopedia)Knight, Frank Hyneman, 1885–1972, American economist, b. McLean County, Ill., Ph.D. Cornell, 1916. He taught economics at the Univ. of Chicago (1927–62). Knight's most influential work was his fir...

Vygotsky, Lev Semyonovich

(Encyclopedia)Vygotsky, Lev Semyonovich, 1896–1934, Russian psychologist. His most productive years were at the Institute of Psychology in Moscow (1924–34), where he expanded his ideas on cognitive development,...

International Geophysical Year

(Encyclopedia)International Geophysical Year (IGY), 18-month period from July, 1957, through Dec., 1958, during a period of maximum sunspot activity, designated for cooperative study of the solar-terrestrial enviro...

fiduciary

(Encyclopedia)fiduciary fĭdo͞oˈshēĕˌrē [key], in law, a person who is obliged to discharge faithfully a responsibility of trust toward another. Among the common fiduciary relationships are guardian to ward, ...

surface tension

(Encyclopedia)surface tension, tendency of liquids to reduce their exposed surface to the smallest possible area. A drop of water, for example, tends to assume the shape of a sphere. The phenomenon is attributed to...

space station

(Encyclopedia)space station or space platform, artificial earth satellite, usually manned, that is placed in a fixed orbit and can serve as a base for astronomical observations; zero-gravity materials processing; s...

metallurgy

(Encyclopedia)metallurgy mĕtˈəlûrˌjē [key], science and technology of metals and their alloys. Modern metallurgical research is concerned with the preparation of radioactive metals, with obtaining metals econ...
 

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