Encyclopædia Britannica Australia -

Encyclopedias since 1768

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Elbrus, Mount ... electric susceptibility

Elbrus, Mount: highest peak of the Caucasus mountains, southwestern Russia. It is an extinct volcano with twin cones reaching 18,510 feet (5,642 m) and 18,356 feet (5,595 m). The volcano was formed during the Upper Tertiary Period, more than 2,500,000 years ago. ...
Elburz Mountains: major mountain range in northern Iran, 560 miles (900 km) long. The range, most broadly defined, extends in an arc eastward from the frontier with Turkmenistan southwest of the Caspian Sea to the Khorasan region of northeastern Iran, southeast of ...
Elcano, Juan Sebastian de: Basque navigator who completed the first circumnavigation of the Earth.
Elche: town, Alicante province, in the autonomous community (region) of Valencia, southeastern Spain, situated on the Rio Vinalopo just south of Alicante city. Of Iberian origin, the site was inhabited by Greeks, Carthaginians, and Romans (who named the town Ilici). Under ...
Elda: city, Alicante province, in the autonomous community (region) of Valencia, southeastern Spain, northwest of Alicante city. Of ancient origin, Elda was called Idella by the Iberians, early peoples of Spain. The city first achieved importance under the Moors, who occupied ...
Eldad Ha-dani: English Eldad The Danite Jewish traveller and philologist who was generally credited with the authorship of a fanciful geographical narrative that exerted an enduring influence throughout the Middle Ages. This possibly gave rise to the legend of Prester John, the ...
Eldeguzid Dynasty: (1137-1225), Iranian atabeg dynasty of Turkish origin that ruled in Azerbaijan (now divided between Iran and Azerbaijan).
elder: in Christianity, any of various church officers. In modern times the title of elder has been used notably in the Presbyterian and Reformed churches and in Mormonism.
elder: any of about 20 to 30 species, mainly shrubs and small trees, comprising the genus Sambucus of the family Caprifoliaceae. Most are native to forested temperate or subtropical areas of both hemispheres. They are important as garden shrubs, as forest ...
Elder, John: Scottish marine engineer whose introduction of the compound steam engine on ships cut fuel consumption and helped make practical long voyages on which refueling was impossible.
Elder, Kate: plainswoman and frontier prostitute of the old American West, companion and possible wife of Doc Holliday (q.v.).
Elder, Lonne, III: American playwright whose critically acclaimed masterwork, Ceremonies in Dark Old Men (1965, revised 1969), depicted the dreams, frustrations, and ultimate endurance of a black family living in the Harlem neighbourhood of New York City in the 1950s.
Elders, Joycelyn: American physician and public health official who served (1993-94) as U.S. surgeon general, the first black and the second woman to hold that post.
Eldon, John Scott, 1st Earl of, Viscount Encombe Of Encombe, Baron Eldon Of Eldon: lord chancellor of England for much of the period between 1801 and 1827. As chief equity judge, he granted the injunction as a remedy more often than earlier lords chancellor had generally done and settled the rules for its use. ...
Eldorado: (Spanish: "The Gilded One"), originally, the legendary ruler of an Indian town near Bogota, who was believed to plaster his naked body with gold dust during festivals, then plunge into Lake Guatavita to wash off the dust after the ceremonies; ...
Eldoret: town, western Kenya, eastern Africa, on the Uasin Gishu Plateau west of the Great Rift Valley. Situated at an elevation of 6,857 feet (2,090 m) above sea level, its healthful climate attracted many European settlers during the colonial period. It ...
Eldridge, Roy: American trumpeter, one of the great creative musicians of the 1930s.
Elea: ancient city in Lucania, Italy, about 25 miles southeast of Paestum; home of the Eleatic school of philosophers, including Parmenides and Zeno. The city was founded about 535 BC by Phocaean Greek refugees on land seized from the native Oenotrians. ...
Eleanor of Aquitaine: queen consort of both Louis VII of France (1137-52) and Henry II of England (1152-1204) and mother of Richard I (the Lion-Heart) and John of England. She was perhaps the most powerful woman in 12th-century Europe.
Eleanor Of Castile: queen consort of King Edward I of England (ruled 1272-1307). Her devotion to Edward helped bring out his better qualities; after her death, his rule became somewhat arbitrary. Eleanor was the daughter of King Ferdinand III of Castile and his ...
Eleanor Of Provence: queen consort of King Henry III of England (ruled 1216-72); her widespread unpopularity intensified the severe conflicts between the King and his barons.
Eleatic One: in Eleatic philosophy, the assertion of Parmenides of Elea that Being is one (Greek: hen) and unique and that it is continuous, indivisible, and all that there is or ever will be.
Eleaticism: one of the principal schools of ancient Pre-Socratic philosophy, so called from its seat in the Greek colony of Elea (or Velia) in southern Italy. This school, which flourished in the 5th century BC, was distinguished by its radical monism; ...
Eleazar ben Azariah: Jewish rabbinic scholar, one of the Palestinian tannaim (those who compiled the Jewish Oral Law), whose practical maxims constitute some of the best-known sayings of the Talmud.
Eleazar ben Judah Of Worms: Jewish rabbi, mystic, Talmudist, and codifier. Along with the Sefer Hasidim (1538; "Book of the Pious"), of which he was a coauthor, his voluminous works are the major extant documents of medieval German Hasidism (an ultrapious sect that stressed prayer ...
election: the formal process of selecting a person for public office or of accepting or rejecting a political proposition by voting. It is important to distinguish between the form and the substance of elections. In some cases, electoral forms are present ...
elector: prince of the Holy Roman Empire who had a right to participate in the election of the emperor (the German king). Beginning around 1273 and with the confirmation of the Golden Bull of 1356, there were seven electors: the archbishops ...
electoral college: the system by which the president and vice president of the United States are chosen. It was devised by the framers of the United States Constitution to provide a method of election that was feasible, ...
Electoral Commission: (1877), in U.S. history, commission created by Congress to resolve the disputed presidential election of 1876 between Republican Rutherford B. Hayes and Democrat Samuel J. Tilden. For the first time since before the Civil War the Democrats had polled a ...
Electra: (Greek: "Bright One"), in Greek legend, the daughter of Agamemnon and Clytemnestra, who saved the life of her young brother Orestes by sending him away when their father was murdered. When he later returned, she helped him to slay their ...
electret: material that retains its electric polarization after being subjected to a strong electric field. The positive charge within the material becomes permanently displaced in the direction of the field, and the negative charge becomes permanently displaced in the direction opposite ...
electric arc: continuous, high-density electric current between two separated conductors in a gas or vapour with a relatively low potential difference, or voltage, across the conductors. The high-intensity light and heat of arcs are utilized in welding, in carbon-arc lamps and arc ...
electric automobile: battery-powered motor vehicle, originating in the late 1880s and used for private passenger, truck, and bus transportation.
electric catfish: (Malapterurus electricus), widely distributed freshwater catfish native to tropical Africa. The only member of the family Malapteruridae, it is a thickset fish with six mouth barbels and a single fin (the adipose fin) on its back, just anterior to the ...
electric charge: quantity of electricity that flows in electric currents or that accumulates on the surfaces of dissimilar nonmetallic substances that are rubbed together vigorously. Electric charge, a basic property of matter, occurs in discrete natural units and is neither created nor ...
electric circuit: path for transmitting electric current. An electric circuit includes a device that gives energy to the charged particles constituting the current, such as a battery or a generator; devices that use current, such as lamps, electric motors, or electronic computers; ...
electric current: any movement of electric charge carriers, such as subatomic charged particles (e.g., electrons having negative charge, protons having positive charge), ions (atoms that have lost or gained one or more electrons), or holes (electron deficiencies that may be thought of ...
electric dipole: pair of equal and opposite electric charges the centres of which are not coincident. An atom in which the centre of the negative cloud of electrons has been shifted slightly away from the nucleus by an external electric field constitutes ...
electric discharge lamp: lighting device consisting of a transparent container within which a gas is energized by an applied voltage and thereby made to glow. The French astronomer Jean Picard observed (1675) a faint glow in a mercury-barometer tube when it was agitated, ...
electric displacement: auxiliary electric field or electric vector that represents that aspect of an electric field associated solely with the presence of separated free electric charges, purposely excluding the contribution of any electric charges bound together in neutral atoms or molecules. If ...
electric eel: elongated South American fish that produces a powerful electric shock to stun its prey, usually other fish.
electric field: region around an electric charge in which an electric force is exerted on another charge. Instead of considering the electric force as a direct interaction of two electric charges at a distance from each other, one charge is considered the ...
electric furnace: heating chamber with electricity as the heat source for achieving very high temperatures to melt and alloy metals and refractories. The electricity has no electrochemical effect on the metal but simply heats it.
electric generator: any machine that converts mechanical energy to electricity for transmission and distribution over power lines to domestic, commercial, and industrial customers. Generators also produce the electrical power required for automobiles, aircraft, ships, and trains.
electric heater: device for heating rooms that converts electric current to heat by means of resistors that emit radiant energy. Resistors may be composed of metal-alloy wire, nonmetallic carbon compounds, or printed circuits. Heating elements may have exposed resistor coils mounted on ...
electric motor: any of a class of devices that convert electrical energy to mechanical energy, usually by employing electromagnetic phenomena such as the coupling between the electrical and mechanical systems. In special situations, the electric supply may come from a battery, as, ...
electric polarization: slight relative shift of positive and negative electric charge in opposite directions within an insulator, or dielectric, induced by an external electric field. Polarization occurs when an electric field distorts the negative cloud of electrons around positive atomic nuclei in ...
electric potential: the amount of work needed to move a unit charge from a reference point to a specific point against an electric field. Typically, the reference point is the Earth, although any point beyond the influence of the electric field charge ...
electric power: energy generated through the conversion of other forms of energy, such as mechanical, thermal, or chemical energy. Electric energy is unrivaled for many uses, as for lighting, computer operation, motive power, and entertainment applications. For other uses it is competitive, ...
electric ray: any of the rays of the families Torpedinidae, Narkidae, and Temeridae, named for their ability to produce electrical shocks. They are found worldwide in warm and temperate waters.
electric susceptibility: quantitative measure of the extent to which an electric field applied to a dielectric material causes polarization, the slight displacement of positive and negative charge within the material. For most linear dielectric materials, the polarization P is directly proportional to ...