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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...

political science

(Encyclopedia)political science, the study of government and political processes, institutions, and behavior. Government and politics have been studied and commented on since the time of the ancient Greeks. However...

interest

(Encyclopedia)interest, charge for the use of credit or money, usually figured as a percentage of the principal and computed annually. Simple interest is computed annually on the principal. Compound interest, paid ...

Rowland, Frank Sherwood

(Encyclopedia)Rowland, Frank Sherwood, 1927–2012, American chemist, b. Delaware, Ohio, Ph.D. Univ. of Chicago, 1952. Rowland taught at Princeton from 1952 to 1956 and at the Univ. of Kansas from 1956 to 1964, whe...

direct action

(Encyclopedia)direct action, theory and methods used by certain labor groups to fight employers, capitalist institutions, and the state by direct economic action, without using intermediate organizations. Political...

catalyst

(Encyclopedia)catalyst, substance that can cause a change in the rate of a chemical reaction without itself being consumed in the reaction; the changing of the reaction rate by use of a catalyst is called catalysis...

capital, in economics

(Encyclopedia)capital, in economics, the elements of production from which an income is derived, usually defined with the exception of land and labor. As originally used in business, capital denoted interest-bearin...

Klein, Christian Felix

(Encyclopedia)Klein, Christian Felix klīn [key], 1849–1925, German mathematician. He is noted for his work in geometry and on the theory of functions. His Erlangen program (1872) for unifying the diverse forms ...

respiration

(Encyclopedia)CE5 Respiratory system respiration, process by which an organism exchanges gases with its environment. The term now refers to the overall process by which oxygen is abstracted from air and is tran...

Kentucky and Virginia Resolutions

(Encyclopedia)Kentucky and Virginia Resolutions, in U.S. history, resolutions passed in opposition to the Alien and Sedition Acts, which were enacted by the Federalists in 1798. The Jeffersonian Republicans first r...