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Wilmut, Sir Ian

(Encyclopedia)Wilmut, Sir Ian, 1944– British embryologist, b. Warwickshire, England, Ph.D. Cambridge, 1971. While doing postdoctoral research at Cambridge, he was part of the team that produced Frostie, the first...

bird of paradise

(Encyclopedia)bird of paradise, common name for any of 43 species of medium- to crow-sized passerine birds of New Guinea and the adjacent islands, known for the bright plumage, elongated tail feathers called wires,...

veterinary medicine

(Encyclopedia)veterinary medicine, diagnosis and treatment of diseases of animals. An early interest in animal diseases is found in ancient Greek writings on medicine. Veterinary medicine began to achieve the statu...

Herodotus

(Encyclopedia)Herodotus hērŏdˈətəs [key], 484?–425? b.c., Greek historian, called the Father of History, b. Halicarnassus, Asia Minor. Only scant knowledge of his life can be gleaned from his writings and fr...

North Rhine–Westphalia

(Encyclopedia)North Rhine–Westphalia nôrtˈrīn-vĕstˌfäˈlən [key], state (1994 pop. 17,759,000), 13,111 sq mi (33,957 sq km), W central Germany. Düsseldorf is the capital. The state is bounded by Belgium a...

Sunni

(Encyclopedia)Sunni so͞oˈnī [key] [Arab. Sunna,=tradition], from ahl al-sunnah wa-l-jamaa [Arab.,=the people of the custom of the Prophet and community], the largest division of Islam. Sunni Islam is the heir to...

conservation of natural resources

(Encyclopedia)conservation of natural resources, the wise use of the earth's resources by humanity. The term conservation came into use in the late 19th cent. and referred to the management, mainly for economic rea...

chaos theory

(Encyclopedia)chaos theory, in mathematics, physics, and other fields, a set of ideas that attempts to reveal structure in aperiodic, unpredictable dynamic systems such as cloud formation or the fluctuation of biol...

eutrophication

(Encyclopedia)eutrophication yo͞otrōˌfĭkāˈshən [key], aging of a lake by biological enrichment of its water. In a young lake the water is cold and clear, supporting little life. With time, streams draining i...

naturalism, in philosophy

(Encyclopedia)naturalism, in philosophy, a position that attempts to explain all phenomena and account for all values by means of strictly natural (as opposed to supernatural) categories. The particular meaning of ...