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special effects

(Encyclopedia)special effects, in motion pictures, cinematographic techniques that create illusions in the audience's minds as well as the illusions created using these techniques. Some common examples are the use ...

Boötes

(Encyclopedia)Boötes bō-ōˈtēz [key] [Gr.,=the herdsman], northern constellation located to the SE of the Big Dipper in Ursa Major and W of Corona Borealis, the Northern Crown. It contains the brilliant orange ...

Centaurus

(Encyclopedia)Centaurus sĕntôrˈəs [key], southern constellation located N and E of Crux, the Southern Cross. It is known especially for its bright stars Alpha Centauri and Hadar. It also contains Centaurus A, a...

West, Jerry

(Encyclopedia)West, Jerry (Jerome Alan West), 1938–, American basketball player, b. Cheylan, W.Va. One of the game's great shooting guards, he led West Virginia Univ. to the 1959 National Collegiate Athletic Asso...

Davy Jones

(Encyclopedia)Davy Jones, personification or spirit of the sea. The name is best known in the expression “Davy Jones's locker,” meaning the bottom of the sea, to which drowned sailors go. ...

Kiel Canal

(Encyclopedia)Kiel Canal, artificial waterway, 61 mi (98 km) long, in Schleswig-Holstein, N central Germany, connecting the North Sea with the Baltic Sea. At sea level, the canal extends from Kiel on the Baltic to ...

Kerch Strait

(Encyclopedia)Kerch Strait, shallow channel, c.25 mi (40 km) long, connecting the Sea of Azov with the Black Sea and separating Crimea in the west from Russia's Taman Peninsula in the east. Its northern end, openin...

Great Rift Valley

(Encyclopedia)Great Rift Valley, geological fault system of SW Asia and E Africa. It extends c.3,000 mi (4,830 km) from N Syria to central Mozambique. The northernmost extension runs S through Syria and Lebanon, th...

Strategic Defense Initiative

(Encyclopedia)Strategic Defense Initiative (SDI), former U.S. government program responsible for research and development of a space-based system to defend the nation from attack by strategic ballistic missiles (se...

stellar populations

(Encyclopedia)stellar populations, two broadly contrasting distributions of star types that are characteristic of different parts of a galaxy. Population I stars are young, recently formed stars, whereas population...