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nitrous oxide

(Encyclopedia)nitrous oxide or nitrogen (I) oxide, chemical compound, N2O, a colorless gas with a sweetish taste and odor. Its density is 1.977 grams per liter at STP. It is soluble in water, alcohol, ether, and ot...

William, prince of Wales

(Encyclopedia)William, (William Arthur Philip Louis), 1982–, Prince of Wales of Great Britian, eldest son of King Charles III and Diana ...

Templewood, Samuel John Gurney Hoare, 1st Viscount

(Encyclopedia)Templewood, Samuel John Gurney Hoare, 1st Viscount, 1880–1959, British statesman. He entered parliament as a Conservative in 1910, served (1922–24, 1924–29) as secretary of state for air, and in...

speedometer

(Encyclopedia)speedometer, instrument that indicates speed. A cable from an automotive speedometer is attached to the rear of the transmission of an automobile; the cable turns at a rate proportional to the speed o...

aerogel

(Encyclopedia)aerogel, any of a group of extremely light and porous solid materials; the lightest is less than four times as dense as dry air. Aerogels are produced from certain gels (see colloid) by heating the ge...

petroleum

(Encyclopedia)petroleum, oily, flammable liquid that occurs naturally in deposits, usually beneath the surface of the earth; it is also called crude oil. It consists principally of a mixture of hydrocarbons, with t...

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...

Schwarzenegger, Arnold Alois

(Encyclopedia)Schwarzenegger, Arnold Alois, 1947–, Austrian-American actor, bodybuilder, and politician, b. Thal, Austria. He began competing in bodybuilding contests in his teens, and won his first of five Mr. U...

Oedipus

(Encyclopedia)Oedipus ĕdˈĭpəs, ēˈdĭ– [key], in Greek legend, son of Laius, king of Thebes, and his wife, Jocasta. Laius had been warned by an oracle that he was fated to be killed by his own son; he theref...

lungs

(Encyclopedia)lungs, elastic organs used for breathing in vertebrate animals, excluding most fish, which use gills, and a few amphibian species that respire through the skin. The word is sometimes applied to the re...