original name Marie Augusta Davey American actress who became one of the leading exemplars of realism on the American stage, especially through her performances in Henrik Ibsen's plays.
in nuclear physics, any species of atomic nucleus that can undergo the fission reaction. The principal fissile materials are uranium-235 (0.7 percent of naturally occurring uranium), plutonium-239, and uranium-233, the last two being artificially produced from the fertile materials uranium-238 ...
in biology, the general process of cell division. If two daughter cells are formed, the process is called binary fission. The production of more than two cells is multiple fission. Binary fission represents the major reproductive procedure of unicellular organisms, ...
in physics, any of the lighter atomic nuclei formed by splitting heavier nuclei (nuclear fission), including both the primary nuclei directly produced (fission fragments) and the nuclei subsequently generated by their radioactive decay. The fission fragments are highly unstable because ...
method of age determination that makes use of the damage done by the spontaneous fission of uranium-238, the most abundant isotope of uranium. The fission process results in the release of several hundred million electron volts of energy and produces ...
in literature, a division of a poem or song, a canto, or a similar division. The word, which is archaic, is of Old English date and has an exact correspondent in Old Saxon fittea, an example of which occurs in ...
in the sport of archery, a form of target shooting competition used in international and world championship events, authorized by the Federation Internationale de Tir a l'Arc (FITA), the world governing body of the sport. The round consists of 144 ...
American particle physicist who was corecipient with James Watson Cronin of the Nobel Prize for Physics in 1980 for an experiment conducted in 1964 that disproved the long-held theory that particle interaction should be indifferent to the direction of time.
city, Worcester county, north-central Massachusetts, U.S. It lies along the Mohawk Trail scenic highway and a branch of the Nashua River, just northwest of Leominster and about 50 miles (80 km) northwest of Boston. The site was first settled in ...
in Islamic usage, a heretical uprising, especially the first major internal struggle within the Muslim community (AD 656-661), which resulted in both civil war and religious schism-between the Sunnites and Shi'ites.
English lady considered by some to be the still-mysterious "dark lady" of William Shakespeare's sonnets, though her authenticated biography does not suggest acquaintance with him. Her colouring is represented as dark on the painted monument of the Fitton family in ...
city, seat (1906) of Ben Hill county, south-central Georgia, U.S., about 80 miles (130 km) south of Macon. It was settled in 1895 after the governor of Georgia, William J. Northern, sponsored a relief train to Midwesterners suffering from a ...
English writer, best known for his Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam, which, though it is a free adaptation and selection from the 12th-century Persian poet's verses, stands on its own as a classic of English literature. It is one of the ...
American singer who became world famous for the wide range and rare sweetness of her voice. She became an international legend during a career that spanned some six decades.
American short-story writer and novelist famous for his depictions of the Jazz Age (the 1920s), his most brilliant novel being The Great Gatsby (1925). His private life, with his wife, Zelda, in both America and France, became almost as celebrated ...
physicist who first suggested a method of producing radio waves, thus helping to lay the basis of wireless telegraphy. He also developed a theory, now known as the Lorentz-FitzGerald contraction, which Einstein used in his own special theory of relativity.
English novelist and biographer noted for her deft characterizations and for her ability to note the telling detail. Although most of her fiction is short, it is intricate in plot.
river in northern Western Australia. It rises in the Durack Range in east Kimberley and traces a 325-mile (525-kilometre) course that flows southwest through the rugged King Leopold Ranges and the Geikie Gorge (where many freshwater crocodiles are found) and ...
river in eastern Queensland, Australia, formed by the confluence of the Dawson and Mackenzie rivers, on the slopes of the Eastern Highlands. The united stream flows northeast across the Broadsound Range and then southeast through distributaries to enter Keppel Bay ...
British naval officer, hydrographer, and meteorologist who commanded the voyage of HMS Beagle, which sailed around the world with Charles Darwin aboard as naturalist. The voyage provided Darwin with much of the material on which he based his theory of ...
professional right-handed baseball pitcher for the National League who was famous for his windup, in which he rotated his pitching arm while twisting his body so that he faced second base before turning to deliver the pitch. His best pitches ...
U.S. racehorse trainer who, during his 78-year career, trained the winners of 2,275 races, bringing in purses totalling more than $13,000,000. He trained more than 250 winners of stakes events, including two winners of the U.S. Triple Crown (the Kentucky ...
art galleries located in Cambridge, Eng. The museum was erected to house the collection bequeathed in 1816 to Cambridge University by Viscount Fitzwilliam. The original building was completed in 1875 and additions were made after 1924. It houses Egyptian, Greek, ...
907) and the founding of the Sung dynasty (960), when five would-be dynasties followed one another in quick succession in North China. The era is also known as the period of the Ten Kingdoms because 10 regimes dominated separate regions ...
the ancient Roman imperial succession of Nerva (reigned AD 96-98), Trajan (98-117), Hadrian (117-138), Antoninus Pius (138-161), and Marcus Aurelius (161-180), who presided over the most majestic days of the Roman Empire. It was not a bloodline; Nerva was raised ...
in Tibetan Buddhism, a group of five deified heroes popularly worshiped as protection against enemies. Some accounts suggest they were five brothers who came to Tibet from northern Mongolia, and they are usually shown wearing broad-rimmed helmets. Diverse traditions exist, ...
card game for three players, devised in 1904 by the U.S. Playing Card Company. It most closely resembles Euchre but shares certain elements with Whist, Bridge, and Auction Pinochle. The game was extremely popular until it was surpassed first by ...
great Taoist-inspired popular movement that occurred near the end of China's Han dynasty (206 BC-AD 220) and greatly weakened the government. The Five Pecks of Rice movement became a prototype of the religiously inspired popular rebellions that were to periodically ...
group of five Russian composers-Cesar Cui, Aleksandr Borodin, Mily Balakirev, Modest Mussorgsky, and Nikolay Rimsky-Korsakov-who in the 1860s banded together in an attempt to create a truly national school of Russian music, free of the stifling influence of Italian opera, ...
system of government proposed by the Chinese revolutionary leader Sun Yat-sen in 1905 as the means through which democracy could be implemented in China after the overthrow of the imperial regime. It provided for a central government composed of five ...
a ball game played by two or four players in a court enclosed on three or four sides, the hard ball being struck with the hand usually protected by a glove. The derivation of the word fives is doubtful. It ...
