(Encyclopedia) EratosthenesEratosthenesĕrətŏsˈthənēz [key], c.275–c.195 b.c., Greek scholar, b. Cyrene. A pupil of Callimachus in Athens, he became (c.240 b.c.) head of the library at Alexandria.…
(Encyclopedia) Atlas, in astronomy, one of the named moons, or natural satellites, of Saturn. Also known as Saturn XV (or S15), Atlas is a small, irregularly shaped (nonspherical) body measuring…
(Encyclopedia) Sakmann, Bert, 1942–, German biophysicist, M.D. Univ. of Göttingen, Germany, 1974. He has been a researcher at the Max Planck Institute for Biophysical Chemistry in Göttingen since…
(Encyclopedia) Cherokee Strip or Cherokee Outlet, a narrow piece of land in N Oklahoma. Bounded on the north by the Kansas border, it has an area of more than 6 million acres (2.4 million hectares).…
(Encyclopedia) Wineland, David Jeffrey, 1944–, American physicist, b. Milwaukee, Wis., Ph.D. Harvard, 1970. Wineland has been a researcher at the National Institute of Standards and Technology and…
(Encyclopedia) Siding Spring Observatory, astronomical observatory located on Siding Spring Mountain, near Coonabarabran, at an altitude of nearly 4,000 ft (1,220 m) in the Warrumbungle Mts. of New…
(Encyclopedia) Celsius, AndersCelsius, Andersänˈdərs sĕlˈsēŭs [key], 1701–44, Swedish astronomer. While professor of astronomy at the Univ. of Uppsala (1730–44), he traveled through Germany, France,…
Circumference and Area: Pi Anyone?GeometryAnatomy of a CircleBasic TermsArcsCircumference and Area: Pi Anyone?TangentsFrom One Theorem Comes Many One of the unusual things about circles is that…
Air pressure is the weight of the atmosphere pressing down on the earth. It is measured by a barometer in units called millibars. Most barometers use mercury in a glass column, like a thermometer,…
