in probability theory, a process for determining the probable location of a point subject to random motions, given the probabilities (the same at each step) of moving some distance in some direction. Random walks are an example of Markov processes, ...
industrial and metropolitan conurbation occupying an area of peat and clay lowlands, west-central Netherlands. The Randstad ("Ring City") consists of major Dutch industrial cities extending in a crescent (open to the southeast) from Utrecht in the east to Dordrecht in ...
former resort by the River Thames in the borough of Kensington and Chelsea, London. Land east of the Royal Hospital, Chelsea, was bought in 1690 by Richard Jones, 3rd Viscount Ranelagh, later 1st earl of Ranelagh, who built a mansion ...
(Japanese: "Dutch learning"), concerted effort by Japanese scholars during the late Tokugawa period (late 18th-19th century) to learn the Dutch language so as to be able to learn Western technology; the term later became synonymous with Western scientific learning in ...
town, southeastern Bangladesh, situated in the Chittagong Hills region near the Karnaphuli River. Connected by road and river steamer with the city of Chittagong, the town is a rice-milling and cotton-weaving centre, and an agricultural market. It has a hospital ...
in radioactivity, the distance that a particle travels from its source through matter. The range depends upon the type of particle, its original energy of motion (kinetic energy), the medium through which it travels, and the particular way in which ...
any of several instruments used to measure the distance from the instrument to a selected point or object. One basic type is the optical range finder modeled after a ranging device developed by the Scottish firm of Barr and Stroud ...
any extensive area of land that is occupied by native herbaceous or shrubby vegetation which is grazed by domestic or wild herbivores. The vegetation of ranges may include tallgrass prairies, steppes (shortgrass prairies), desert shrublands, shrub woodlands, savannas, chaparrals, and ...
any of a series of nine unmanned probes launched from 1961 to 1965 by the United States National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA). Project Ranger represented NASA's earliest attempt at lunar exploration. Ranger 4 (1962) became the first U.S. spacecraft ...
in U.S. military usage, a soldier specially trained to act in small groups that make rapid surprise raids on enemy territory. Ranger has also been the designation for the Texas state constabulary and for national-park supervisors and forest wardens.
river in east-central South Island, New Zealand. It is formed by the confluence of the Clyde and Havelock rivers, which rise in the Southern Alps. The river's name is of Maori derivation and means "low sky." The river passes through ...
river in southwestern North Island, New Zealand. Rising on the east slopes of the Kaimanawa Mountains, it flows south and southwest for 150 miles (240 km) to enter South Taranaki Bight of the Tasman Sea, 60 miles (97 km) south ...
city, northwestern Bangladesh, on the Ghaghat River. It is an industrial centre noted for the manufacture of dhurries (cotton carpets), bidis (cigarettes), and cigars. Constituted a municipality in 1869, it contains eight government colleges affiliated with the University of Rajshahi; ...
family of wide-ranging frogs of the order Anura, containing more than 400 species. Representatives occur on every continent except Antarctica. Members of the group are referred to as the true frogs because of their generalized body form and life history.
original name Otto Rosenfeld Austrian psychologist who extended psychoanalytic theory to the study of legend, myth, art, and creativity and who suggested that the basis of anxiety neurosis is a psychological trauma occurring during the birth of the individual.
leading German historian of the 19th century, whose scholarly method and way of teaching (he was the first to establish a historical seminar) had a great influence on Western historiography. He was ennobled (with the addition of von to his ...
in heat engines, ideal cyclical sequence of changes of pressure and temperature of a fluid, such as water, used in an engine, such as a steam engine. It is used as a thermodynamic standard for rating the performance of steam ...
(Jan. 24, 1722), classification of grades in the Russian military, naval, and civil services into a hierarchy of 14 categories and the foundation of a system of promotion based on personal ability and performance rather than on birth and genealogy. ...
geographic region in the Grampian Mountains of Scotland, composed mainly of moorland and lochs (lakes). The region includes Loch Rannoch, part of the Tummel-Ericht hydroelectric scheme, and, south of the loch, Rannoch Moor, a bleak windswept area of 20 square ...
town, southern Thailand, on the west coast of the Malay Peninsula. Ranong town is a fishing port in the Pakchan River estuary. Burma lies to the northwest, and there are highlands to the east. Ranong is also in a tin-mining ...
American poet and critic, leading theorist of the Southern literary renaissance that began after World War I. Ransom's The New Criticism (1941) provided the name of the influential mid-20th-century school of criticism (see New Criticism).
village, Champaign county, east-central Illinois, U.S. It lies about 15 miles (25 km) north of Urbana. Settled with the arrival of the Illinois Central Railroad in 1854, it was named for Robert Rantoul, a director of the railroad. For much ...
the buttercup family (order Ranunculales), comprising about 1,900 species in some 50 genera of flowering plants, mostly herbs, which are widely distributed in all temperate and subtropical regions. In the tropics they occur mostly at high elevations.
buttercup order of dicotyledonous flowering plants, a division of the subclass Magnoliidae. The order contains 8 families, 167 genera, and about 3,200 species. They range from annual and perennial herbs, to herbaceous or woody vines, to shrubs, and, in a ...
French chemist who formulated a law on solutions (called Raoult's law) that made it possible to determine the molecular weights of dissolved substances.
Polish socialist and economist who joined the communists after World War II and who, as minister of foreign affairs, was noted for his "Rapacki Plan" for an atom-bomb-free zone in Europe.
(species Brassica napus), plant of the mustard family (Brassicaceae), native to Europe. Rape is an annual, 30 cm (1 foot) or more tall, with a long, usually thin taproot. Its leaves are smooth, bluish green, and deeply scalloped, and the ...
act of sexual intercourse with an individual without his or her consent, through force or the threat of force. In many jurisdictions, the crime of rape has been subsumed under that of sexual assault, which also encompasses acts that fall ...
master painter and architect of the Italian High Renaissance. Raphael is best known for his Madonnas (see ) and for his large figure compositions in the Vatican in Rome. His work is admired for its clarity of form and ease ...
in the Bible and the Qur'an, one of the archangels. In the Old Testament apocryphal Book of Tobit, he is the one who, in human disguise and under the name of Azarias ("Yahweh helps"), accompanied Tobias in his adventurous journey ...
city, seat (1877) of Pennington county, western South Dakota, U.S. It lies at the eastern edge of the Black Hills on Rapid Creek, from which it derived its name.
system of railways, usually electric, that is used for local transit in a metropolitan area. A rapid transit line may run underground (subway), above street level (elevated transit line), or at street level. Rapid transit is distinguished from other forms ...
a shuttleless weaving loom in which the filling yarn is carried through the shed of warp yarns to the other side of the loom by fingerlike carriers called rapiers. One type has a single long rapier that reaches across the ...
association formed in the Soviet Union in 1928 out of various groups of proletarian writers who were dedicated to defining a truly proletarian literature and to eliminating writers whose works were not thoroughly imbued with Communist ideology. Under the leadership ...
river flowing entirely through Virginia, U.S. It rises near Chester Gap in the Blue Ridge Mountains east of Front Royal and flows southeastward past Fredericksburg (head of navigation and of tidewater) to enter Chesapeake Bay after a course of 212 ...
any of the Irish nationalists who employed guerrilla methods to resist the English after the regular Irish army had surrendered in the war (1689-91) in Ireland. They were termed rapparees after their weapons, short pikes (Irish: rapaire). The elusiveness of ...
