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aurora borealis

(Encyclopedia)aurora borealis ôstrāˈlĭs [key], luminous display of various forms and colors seen in the night sky. The aurora borealis of the Northern Hemisphere is often called the northern lights, and the aur...

megachurch

(Encyclopedia)megachurch, large Protestant church with an average weekly attendance of 2,000 or more; relatively uncommon until after 1970. In the United States, where most megachurches are located, there were more...

lighthouse

(Encyclopedia)lighthouse, towerlike structure erected to give guidance and warning to ships and aircraft by either visible or radioelectrical means. Lighthouses were long built to conform in structure to their geog...

Grossman, David

(Encyclopedia)Grossman, David, 1954–, Israeli writer and peace activist, b. Jerusalem. He is widely recognized as the finest novelist in the generation that followed Amos Oz and A. B. Yehoshua. The son of a Polis...

cable television

(Encyclopedia)cable television, the transmission of televised images to viewers by means of coaxial cables. Cable systems receive the television signal, which is sent out over cables to individual subscribers, by a...

space science

(Encyclopedia)space science, body of scientific knowledge as it relates to space exploration; it is sometimes also called astronautics. Space science draws on the conventional sciences of physics, chemistry, biolog...

telegraph

(Encyclopedia)telegraph, term originally applied to any device or system for distant communication by means of visible or audible signals, now commonly restricted to electrically operated devices. Attempts at long-...

navigation satellite

(Encyclopedia)navigation satellite, artificial satellite designed expressly to aid the navigation of sea and air traffic. Early navigation satellites, from the Transit series launched in 1960 to the U.S. navy's Nav...

radiation

(Encyclopedia)radiation rāˌdēāˈshən [key], term applied to the emission and transmission of energy through space or through a material medium and also to the radiated energy itself. In its widest sense the te...

advertising

(Encyclopedia)advertising, in general, any openly sponsored offering of goods, services, or ideas through any medium of public communication. At its inception advertising was merely an announcement; for example, en...