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tangent

(Encyclopedia)tangent, in mathematics. 1 In geometry, the tangent to a circle or sphere is a straight line that intersects the circle or sphere in one and only one point. For other curves and surfaces the tangent l...

Groton

(Encyclopedia)Groton grŏtˈən [key]. <1> Town (2020 pop. 38,411), New London co., SE Conn., includi...

Channel Islands, California

(Encyclopedia)Channel Islands or Santa Barbara Islands sănˈtə bärˈbrə, –bərə [key], chain of eight rugged islands and many islets, extending c.150 mi (240 km) along the S Calif. coast from Point Conceptio...

Patton, George Smith, Jr.

(Encyclopedia)Patton, George Smith, Jr., 1885–1945, American general, b. San Gabriel, Calif. A graduate of West Point (1909), he served in World War I and was wounded while commanding a tank brigade in France. Su...

Navigation Acts

(Encyclopedia)Navigation Acts, in English history, name given to certain parliamentary legislation, more properly called the British Acts of Trade. The acts were an outgrowth of mercantilism, and followed principle...

moment

(Encyclopedia)moment, in physics and engineering, term designating the product of a quantity and a distance (or some power of the distance) to some point associated with that quantity. The most theoretically useful...

deliquescence

(Encyclopedia)deliquescence dĕlˌəkwĕsˈəns [key], conversion of a solid substance into a liquid as a result of absorption of water vapor from the air. Since impurities in a solid lower its melting point, the a...

projective geometry

(Encyclopedia)projective geometry, branch of geometry concerned with those properties of geometric figures that remain invariant under projection. The basic elements are points, lines, and planes, and the following...

Meade, George Gordon

(Encyclopedia)Meade, George Gordon, 1815–72, Union general in the American Civil War, b. Cádiz, Spain. Graduated from West Point in 1835, he resigned from the army the next year and became a civil engineer. In 1...

Groves, Leslie Richard

(Encyclopedia)Groves, Leslie Richard, 1896–1970, American army officer and engineer who headed the program that developed America's atomic bomb, b. Albany, N.Y., grad. West Point (1918). He was commissioned in th...