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entropy

(Encyclopedia)entropy ĕnˈtrəpē [key], quantity specifying the amount of disorder or randomness in a system bearing energy or information. Originally defined in thermodynamics in terms of heat and temperature, e...

van der Waals, Johannes Diderik

(Encyclopedia)van der Waals, Johannes Diderik yōhäˈnəs dēˈdərĭk vän dər väls [key], 1837–1923, Dutch physicist. It had been known for some time that the behavior of real gases differs from that of an i...

molecule

(Encyclopedia)molecule mŏlˈəkyo͞ol [key] [New Lat.,=little mass], smallest particle of a compound that has all the chemical properties of that compound. A single atom is usually not referred to as a molecule, a...

Werner, Abraham Gottlob

(Encyclopedia)Werner, Abraham Gottlob äˈbrähäm gôtˈlōp vĕrˈnər [key], 1750–1817, German geologist. In 1775 he became inspector and teacher in the mining academy at Freiberg, which through his efforts be...

Cronin, James Watson

(Encyclopedia)Cronin, James Watson, 1931–2016, American nuclear physicist, b. Chicago, Ph.D. Univ. of Chicago, 1955. Cronin and co-researcher Val Logsdon Fitch were awarded the 1980 Nobel Prize in Physics for a 1...

psychoanalysis

(Encyclopedia)psychoanalysis, name given by Sigmund Freud to a system of interpretation and therapeutic treatment of psychological disorders. Psychoanalysis began after Freud studied (1885–86) with the French neu...

Hampshire, Sir Stuart Newton

(Encyclopedia)Hampshire, Sir Stuart Newton, 1914–2004, British philosopher, grad. Oxford. He taught at Oxford, University College (London), London Univ., and Princeton before joining (1984, emeritus after 1990) t...

Robertson, Sir Dennis

(Encyclopedia)Robertson, Sir Dennis, 1890–1963, British economist, grad. Trinity College, Cambridge. A professor at Cambridge (1944–57), he also handled Anglo-American financial relationships during World War I...

Abrikosov, Alexei Alekseyevich

(Encyclopedia)Abrikosov, Alexei Alekseyevich, 1928–2017, Russian-American physicist, Ph.D. Institute for Physical Problems, USSR Academy of Sciences, 1951. Abrikosov was a researcher at the Institute, then from 1...

liquefaction

(Encyclopedia)liquefaction, change of a substance from the solid or the gaseous state to the liquid state. Since the different states of matter correspond to different amounts of energy of the molecules making up t...