Columbia Encyclopedia

(Encyclopedia) Nirenberg, Marshall Warren, 1927–2010, American biochemist, b. Brooklyn, N.Y., Ph.D., Univ. of Michigan, 1947. He spent his entire career as a researcher at the National Institutes of Health. Nirenb...

(Encyclopedia) Young, Michael Warren, 1949–, American geneticist, b. Miami, Fla., Ph.D. Univ. of Texas, Austin, 1975. Young has been on the faculty at Rockefeller Univ. since 1978, and he was also an investigator ...

(Encyclopedia) Escher, M. C. (Maurits Cornelis Escher) ĕsˈkhər [key], 1898–1972, Dutch artist. Primarily a graphic artist, Escher composed works notable for their irony, often with impossible perspectives rende...

(Encyclopedia) Marlowe, Christopher, 1564–93, English dramatist and poet, b. Canterbury. Probably the greatest English dramatist before Shakespeare, Marlowe, a shoemaker's son, was educated at Cambridge and he wen...

(Encyclopedia) Rodgers, Christopher Raymond Perry, 1819–92, American naval officer, b. Brooklyn, N.Y. Appointed midshipman in 1833, he served in the Mexican War. In the Civil War he took part in the Union reductio...

(Encyclopedia) Stamp Act, 1765, revenue law passed by the British Parliament during the ministry of George Grenville. The first direct tax to be levied on the American colonies, it required that all newspapers, pamp...

(Encyclopedia) James, M. R. (Montague Rhodes James), 1862–1936, English scholar, educator, and writer. He attended Eton and King's College, Cambridge, became (1887) a fellow at King's, and held various offices the...

(Encyclopedia) Helmholtz, Hermann Ludwig Ferdinand von hĕrˈmän lo͞otˈvĭkh fĕrˈdēnänt fən hĕlmˈhôlts [key], 1821–94, German scientist. Although known especially as a physicist and biologist, he was al...

(Encyclopedia) Pei, I. M. (Ieoh Ming Pei) pā [key], 1917–2019, Chinese-American architect, b. Guangzhou, China. Pei immigrated to the United States in 1935 and studied at the Univ. of Pennsylvania, the Massachuse...