Columbia Encyclopedia

(Encyclopedia) vacuum tube: see electron tube. ...

(Encyclopedia) gas tube: see electron tube.

(Encyclopedia) Crookes tube, device invented by Sir William Crookes (c.1875) consisting essentially of a sealed glass tube from which nearly all the air has been removed and through the walls of which are passed two...

(Encyclopedia) ray, in physics, term denoting the straight line along which light or other form of radiation is propagated from its source. It generally refers to the line of propagation of waves but is also applied...

(Encyclopedia) test-tube baby: see in vitro fertilization. ...

(Encyclopedia) radar, system or technique for detecting the position, movement, and nature of a remote object by means of radio waves reflected from its surface. Although most radar units use microwave frequencies, ...

(Encyclopedia) liquid crystal, liquid whose component particles, atoms or molecules, tend to arrange themselves with a degree of order far exceeding that found in ordinary liquids and approaching that of solid cryst...

(Encyclopedia) Moseley, Henry Gwyn Jeffreys mōzˈlē [key], 1887–1915, English physicist, grad. Trinity College, Oxford, 1910. He began his research under Ernest Rutherford while serving as lecturer at the Univ. ...

(Encyclopedia)  CE5 Video transmission and reception of color and black-and-white television: The camera lens focuses collected light rays into mirrors, which separate the image into its three primary color compon...

(Encyclopedia) computer terminal, a device that enables a computer to receive or deliver data. Computer terminals vary greatly depending on the format of the data they handle. For example, a simple early terminal co...