Russian hockey player who was regarded as one of the best defensemen in the history of the sport. As a member of the Soviet Olympic team in the 1980s, he won two gold medals and a silver. He was also ...
Italian Baroque painter whose best-known works are small representations of biblical parables as scenes from everyday life-e.g., The Good Samaritan (Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York City). These works, which Fetti painted between 1618 and 1622, were ...
a continuing state of conflict between two groups within a society (typically kinship groups) characterized by violence, usually killings and counterkillings. It exists in many nonliterate communities in which there is an absence of law or a breakdown of legal ...
system by which land was held by tenants from lords. As developed in medieval England and France, the king was lord paramount with numerous levels of lesser lords down to the occupying tenant.
term that emerged in the 17th century and has been used to describe European economic, legal, political, and social relationships that existed in the Middle Ages. Derived from the Latin word feudum (fief) but unknown to people ...
conservative political club of the French Revolution, which met in the former monastery of the Feuillants (Reformed Cistercians) near the Tuileries, in Paris.
French dancer, dancing master, and choreographer whose dance notation system was published in his Choregraphie ou l'art de decrire la danse (1700; "Choreography, or the Art of Describing the Dance"). Working in Paris, he collaborated with Andre Lorin, conductor of ...
abnormally high bodily temperature or a disease of which an abnormally high temperature is characteristic. Although most often associated with infection, fever is also observed in other pathologic states, such as cancer, coronary artery occlusion, and disorders of the blood. ...
any of the four North American plant species of the genus Triosteum, all coarse perennials belonging to the family Caprifoliaceae. The other six species of the genus are Asian. The common names feverwort, wild ipecac, and horse gentian resulted from ...
popular French motion-picture director of the 1920s and '30s whose films are imbued with a sympathy for the common man and an attempt at psychological interpretation of character. His sharp criticism of French social and political trends was subordinated to ...
a graphical method of representing the interactions of elementary particles, invented in the 1940s and '50s by the American theoretical physicist Richard P. Feynman. Introduced during the development of the theory of quantum electrodynamics as an aid for visualizing and ...
American theoretical physicist who was widely regarded as the most brilliant, influential, and iconoclastic figure in his field in the post-World War II era.
town, northeastern Afghanistan. It lies along the Kowkcheh River, at 4,000 feet (1,200 m) above sea level. Feyzabad was destroyed by Morad Beg of Qonduz in 1821 and its inhabitants removed to Qonduz, but, after Badakhshan was annexed by 'Abd ...
historic region of northern Africa and until 1963 one of the three provinces of the United Kingdom of Libya. It is part of the Sahara (desert) and now constitutes the southwestern sector of Libya.
French coach for hire, named for the Hotel Saint-Fiacre, in Paris, where it was introduced in the 1640s. The first fiacres were boxlike, four-wheeled, open, hooded vehicles that were drawn by three horses and were designed to navigate the muddy ...
town, east-central Madagascar. The town was founded in 1830. It lies on the eastern fringe of a forested escarpment at an average elevation of 4,000 feet (1,200 m) and consists of upper and lower towns, surrounded by woodland. The town ...
international holding company and major Italian manufacturer of automobiles, trucks, and industrial vehicles and components. It is the largest family-owned corporation in Italy. Headquarters are in Turin.
Danish pathologist who received the Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine in 1926 for achieving the first controlled induction of cancer in laboratory animals, a development of profound importance to cancer research.
the elements of the sequence of numbers 1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13, 21, &elipsis;, each of which, after the second, is the sum of the two previous numbers. These numbers were first noted by the medieval Italian mathematician ...
in textile production, basic unit of raw material having suitable length, pliability, and strength for conversion into yarns and fabrics. A fibre of extreme length is a filament. Fibres can occur naturally or can be produced artificially. See Man-Made Fibres; ...
the science of transmitting data, voice, and images by the passage of light through thin, transparent fibres. In telecommunications, fibre optic technology has virtually replaced copper wire in long-distance telephone lines, and it is used to link computers within local ...
fibre whose chemical composition, structure, and properties are significantly modified during the manufacturing process. Man-made fibres are spun and woven into a huge number of consumer and industrial products, including garments such as shirts, scarves, and hosiery; home furnishings such ...
an insoluble protein that is produced in response to bleeding and is the major component of the blood clot. Fibrin is a tough protein substance that is arranged in long fibrous chains; it is formed from fibrinogen, a soluble protein ...
the principal nonmotile cells of connective tissue; fibroblasts are large, flat, elongated (spindle-shaped) cells possessing processes extending out from the ends of the cell body. The cell nucleus is flat and oval. Fibroblasts produce tropocollagen, which is the forerunner of ...
either of two unrelated diseases, one affecting the breast and the other affecting the pancreas. For a discussion of the disease of the pancreas, see cystic fibrosis.
any benign tumour of fibrous tissue. Specific fibromas include nonossifying fibroma, found in the large long bones; it is relatively common in older children and young adults. Fibromas can occur in many areas of the body and may remain symptomless ...
chronic syndrome that is characterized by musculoskeletal pain, often at multiple anatomical sites, that occurs in the absence of an identifiable physical or physiological cause. A significant number of persons with fibromyalgia also have mental disorders, especially depression. Fibromyalgia is ...
an uncommon malignant tumour of fibrous tissue found in young adults and most often occurring in the thighbone, upper arm bone, or jaw. The mass is felt before pain occurs. This tumour invades surrounding tissues, which makes complete surgical excision ...
rare congenital developmental disorder beginning in childhood, characterized by cyst formation and replacement of solid, calcified bone with fibrous tissue, often only on one side of the body, in the long bones and pelvis. Other signs include unilateral (one-sided) enlargement ...
brooch, or pin, originally used in Greek and Roman dress for fastening garments. The fibula developed in a variety of shapes, but all were based on the safety-pin principle.
(Latin: "brooch"), outer of two bones of lower leg or hindlimb, probably so named because the other bone, the tibia, and the fibula together resemble an ancient brooch, or pin. In humans the head of the fibula is joined to ...
mountains in northeastern Bavaria Land (state), southeastern Germany. They lie at the Czech border between the Franconian Forest in the northwest, the Ore Mountains (in German, Erzgebirge; in Czech, Krusne Hory) in the northeast, and the Upper ...
Italian philosopher, theologian, and linguist whose translations and commentaries on the writings of Plato and other classical Greek authors generated the Florentine Platonist Renaissance that influenced European thought for two centuries.
German linguist, a pioneer in Indo-European etymological research who made the first comprehensive study of the common vocabulary of Indo-European languages and sought to determine their prototype.
literature created from the imagination, not presented as fact, though it may be based on a true story or situation. Types of literature in the fiction genre include the novel, short story, and novella. The word is from the Latin ...
