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septic tank

(Encyclopedia)septic tank, underground sedimentation tank in which sewage is retained for a short period while it is decomposed and purified by bacterial action. The organic matter in the sewage settles to the bott...

universe

(Encyclopedia)universe, totality of matter and energy in existence. The study of the origin of the universe, or cosmos, is known as cosmogony, and that of its structure and evolution, cosmology. The age of the univ...

Notker Balbulus

(Encyclopedia)Notker Balbulus nōtˈkər bălˈbyo͝oləs [key], c.840–912, German monk and scholar, abbot of St. Gall (from 890). He composed liturgical poetry and music. Notker's life of Charlemagne preserves m...

Nollet, Jean Antoine

(Encyclopedia)Nollet, Jean Antoine zhäN äNtwänˈ nôlāˈ [key], 1700–1770, French clergyman, experimental physicist, and leading member of the Paris Academy of Science. He constructed one of the first electro...

Barkla, Charles Glover

(Encyclopedia)Barkla, Charles Glover glŭˈvər bärˈklə [key], 1877–1944, English physicist. He was professor of natural philosophy at Edinburgh from 1913. For his discovery of the characteristic X rays of ele...

Randall, Lisa

(Encyclopedia)Randall, Lisa, 1962–, American theoretical physicist and writer, b. New York City, B.A. Harvard University, 1983, Ph.D. Harvard University, 1987. Rand...

supernova

(Encyclopedia)supernova, a massive star in the latter stages of stellar evolution that suddenly contracts and then explodes, increasing its energy output as much as a billionfold. Supernovas are the principal distr...

Alexander of Hales

(Encyclopedia)Alexander of Hales, d. 1245, English scholastic philosopher, called the Unanswerable Doctor by his fellow scholastics. He was a Franciscan and a lecturer at the Univ. of Paris. His Summa universae the...

Ferguson

(Encyclopedia)Ferguson, city (2020 pop. 20,359), St. Louis co., E Mo., a suburb of St. Louis; inc. 1894. It is primarily residential. In Aug. 2014, the shooting of an...

aquaponics

(Encyclopedia)aquaponics, the growing of plants and the raising of fish by combining aquaculture with the techniques of hydroponics, usually on a small scale. Water containing fish waste matter is used as the nutri...