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nest: structure created by an animal to house its eggs, its young, or, in some cases, itself. Nests are built by a few invertebrates, especially the social insects, and by some ...
Nestle SA: multinational manufacturer of food products. It is headquartered in Vevey, Switzerland, and operates factories in more than 80 countries. Nestle's chief products are condensed and powdered milk, baby foods, chocolate ...
Nestor: a monk in Kievan Rus of the Monastery of the Caves in Kiev (from about 1074), author of several works of hagiography and an important historical chronicle.
Nestor: in Greek legend, king of Pylos (Navarino) in Elis. All of his brothers were slain by the Greek hero Heracles (the Roman Hercules), but Nestor escaped. In the Iliad he ...
Nestor, Agnes: American labour leader and reformer, remembered as a powerful force in unionizing women workers in several clothing and related industries in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.
Nestorian: member of a Christian sect originating in Asia Minor and Syria out of the condemnation of Nestorius and his teachings by the councils of Ephesus (AD 431) and Chalcedon (AD ...
Nestorius: early bishop of Constantinople whose views on the nature and person of Christ led to the calling of the Council of Ephesus in 431 and to Nestorianism, one of the ...
Nestos River: river in southwestern Bulgaria and western Thrace, Greece. The Nestos rises on Kolarov peak of the Rila Mountains of the northwestern Rhodope (Rodopi) Mountains. The river's upper confluents separate the ...
Nestroy, Johann: one of Austria's greatest comic dramatists, and a brilliant character actor who dominated the mid-19th-century Viennese popular stage.
net: an open fabric of thread, cord, or wire, the intersections of which are looped or knotted so as to form a mesh. Nets are primarily used for fishing.
net-winged beetle: any of the approximately 2,800 species of soft-bodied, brightly coloured, predominately tropical beetles of the family Lycidae (order Coleoptera). The broad, leathery wing covers (elytra), which are wider at the ...
Netanya: city, west-central Israel. It lies on the Mediterranean coast, 19 miles (30 km) north of Tel Aviv-Yafo. Because of its proximity to the West Bank, the city was a frequent ...
Netanyahu, Benjamin: Israeli politician and diplomat, who was his country's prime minister from 1996 to 1999.
netball: popular game in girls' schools in England and several other British Commonwealth countries, similar to six-player girls' basketball in the United States. It is played on a hard-surfaced rectangular court ...
Netherlandic language: a West Germanic language that is the national language of The Netherlands and, with French, one of the two official languages of Belgium. Although speakers of English usually call the ...
Netherlands Antilles: five islands in the Caribbean Sea, an autonomous part of the Kingdom of The Netherlands. The group is composed of two widely separated groups approximately 500 miles (800 kilometres) apart. ...
Netherlands Reformed Church, The: largest Protestant church in The Netherlands, the successor of the established Dutch Reformed Church that developed during the Protestant Reformation in the 16th century. Reforming interest emerged in the Netherlands ...
Netherlands, The: country located in northwestern Europe. The name Holland (from Houtland, or "Wooded Land") was originally given to one of the medieval cores of what later became the ...
Neto, Agostinho: poet, physician, and first president of the People's Republic of Angola.
Netscape Communications Corp.: American developer of Internet software with headquarters in Mountain View, California.
Netscher, Caspar: German painter of the Baroque era who established a fashionable practice as a portrait painter.
netsuke: ornamental togglelike piece, usually of carved ivory, used to attach a medicine box, pipe, or tobacco pouch to the obi (sash) of a Japanese man's traditional dress. During the Tokugawa ...
netting: in textiles, ancient method of constructing open fabrics by the crossing of cords, threads, yarns, or ropes so that their intersections are knotted or looped, forming a geometrically shaped mesh, ...
Neuber, Caroline: actress-manager who was influential in the development of modern German theatre.
Neubrandenburg: city, Mecklenburg-West Pomerania Land (state), northeastern Germany. It lies near the northern end of Tollense Lake, where the Tollense River flows from the lake, about 50 miles ...
Neuchatel: capital (since 1815) of Neuchatel canton, western Switzerland, on the northwestern shore of Lake Neuchatel, at the mouth of the Seyon River, partly on the slopes of the Chaumont (3,566 ...
Neuchatel: canton, western Switzerland, bordering France to the northwest and Lake Neuchatel to the southeast and bounded by the cantons of Bern on the northeast and Vaud on the southwest. It ...
Neuchatel crisis: (1856-57), tense episode of Swiss history that had repercussions among the Great Powers of Europe. The Congress of Vienna (1814-15), in its general settlement of territorial questions after the Napoleonic ...
Neuchatel, Lake: largest lake wholly in Switzerland; its area of 84 square miles (218 square km) is divided among the cantons of Neuchatel, Vaud, Fribourg, and Bern. Lakes Neuchatel, Biel (Bienne), and ...
Neue Kunstlervereinigung: exhibiting group founded in Munich, Germany, in 1909 by Wassily Kandinsky, Alexey von Jawlensky, Gabriele Munter, and numerous others who were united by opposition to the official art of Munich ...
Neue Sachlichkeit: (German: New Objectivity), a group of German artists in the 1920s whose works were executed in a realistic style (in contrast to the prevailing styles of Expressionism and Abstraction) and ...
Neue Zurcher Zeitung: Swiss daily newspaper published in Zurich and generally considered one of the world's great newspapers.
Neuengamme-Ring: a complex of Nazi German concentration camps situated in marshy country near Neuengamme, a suburb of the port city of Hamburg, Germany.
Neuhof, Theodor, Baron: German adventurer. An indefatigable intriguer in military, political, and financial affairs throughout Europe, he was for a time (1736-43) the nominal king of Corsica under the style of Theodore I.
Neuilly, Treaty of: (Nov. 27, 1919), peace treaty between Bulgaria and the victorious Allied powers after World War I that became effective Aug. 9, 1920. Under its terms Bulgaria was forced to cede ...
Neuilly-sur-Seine: exclusive residential northwestern suburb of Paris, France. It lies in Hauts-de-Seine departement, Ile-de-France region, west of the capital and north of the Bois de ...
Neukolln: Bezirk (district) in the southern part of the city of Berlin, Germany. Medieval village churches still mark the centres of the four old villages-Rixdorf, Britz, Buckow, and Rudow-around which the ...
Neumann line: any of the fine, straight, scratchlike marks that appear when some iron meteorites are cut open and the exposed surface polished and etched. The lines reveal an internal structure thought ...
Neumann, Balthasar: German architect who was the foremost master of the late Baroque style.
Neumann, Saint John: bishop of Philadelphia, a leader in the Roman Catholic parochial-school system in the United States.
neume: in musical notation, a sign for one or more successive musical pitches, predecessor of modern musical notes. Neumes have been used in Christian (e.g., Gregorian, Byzantine) liturgical chant as well ...
Neuqun: city, capital of Neuquen provincia, west-central Argentina. It is located at the confluence of the Neuquen and Limay rivers, which there form the Negro River. Founded in ...
Neuqun: provincia (province), west-central Argentina. It is bordered by the high peaks of the Andes Mountains and Chile (west), the Colorado River and tributaries (north), and the Limay ...
neural crest: group of embryonic cells that are pinched off during the formation of the neural tube (the precursor of the spinal cord) but that do not remain as a part of ...
neural network: a computer program that operates in a manner analogous to the natural neural network in the brain. The theoretical basis of neural networks was developed in 1943 by the neurophysiologist ...
neural tube defect: any congenital defect of the brain and spinal cord as a result of abnormal development of the neural tube (the precursor of the spinal cord) during early embryonic life, usually ...
neuralgia: cyclic attacks of acute pain occurring in a peripheral sensory nerve; the cause of the pain is unknown, and pathological changes in nerve tissue cannot be found. There are two ...
Neurath, Konstantin, Baron von: German diplomat who was Adolf Hitler's foreign minister from 1933 to 1938.
neuritis: inflammation of one or more nerves. The characteristic symptoms of neuritis include pain and tenderness; impaired sensation, strength, and reflexes; and abnormal circulation and decreased ability to sweat in the ...
neurofibromatosis: either of two hereditary disorders characterized by distinctive skin lesions and by benign, progressively enlarging tumours of the nervous system. Neurofibromatosis type 1, also known as von Recklinghausen's disease, is ...
neurogenic arthropathy: (after Jean-Martin Charcot, a 19th-century French neurologist), massive destruction of a stress-bearing joint, with development of large flanges and spurs of new bone at the sides of the joint. The ...
neurohormone: any of a group of substances produced by specialized cells (neurosecretory cells) structurally typical of the nervous, rather than of the endocrine, system. The neurohormones pass along nerve-cell extensions (axons) ...
neurolinguistics: the study of the neurological mechanisms underlying the storage and processing of language. Although it has been fairly satisfactorily determined that the language centre is in the left hemisphere of ...
neurology: medical specialty concerned with the nervous system and its functional or organic disorders. Neurologists diagnose and treat diseases and disorders of the brain, spinal cord, and nerves.
neuromuscular junction: site of chemical communication between a nerve fibre and a muscle cell. The neuromuscular junction is analogous to the synapse between two neurons. A nerve fibre divides into many terminal ...
neuron: basic cell of the nervous system in vertebrates and most invertebrates from the level of the cnidarians (e.g., corals, jellyfish) upward. A typical neuron has a cell body containing a ...
neuropteran: any member of the insect order Neuroptera. At one time the term neuropteran referred to many groups of insects that are now placed in other orders, so that, in a ...
neurosecretory cell: a type of neuron, or nerve cell, whose function is to translate neural signals into chemical stimuli. Such cells produce secretions called neurohormones that travel along the neuron axon and ...
neurotransmitter: any of a group of chemical agents released by neurons (nerve cells) to stimulate neighbouring neurons, thus allowing impulses to be passed from one cell to the next throughout the ...
Neuschwanstein Castle: elaborate castle built atop a rock ledge over the Pollat Gorge in the Bavarian Alps (near Fussen, Ger.) by order of Bavaria's King Louis II, called "Mad Ludwig." Begun in ...
Neuse River: river in northeast-central North Carolina, U.S., formed by the junction of the Flat, Little, and Eno rivers in Durham county. Named in 1584 for the Neusiok Indians, it flows about ...
Neuserre: sixth king of the 5th dynasty (c. 2465-c. 2325 BC) of Egypt; he is primarily known for his temple to the sun-god Re at Abu Jirab (Abu Gurab) in Lower ...
Neusiedler Lake: lake in Burgenland (eastern Austria) and northwestern Hungary, named from the Austrian town of Neusiedl and the Hungarian word for "swamp lake." Formed several million years ago during the Pleistocene ...
Neuss: city, North Rhine-Westphalia Land (state), western Germany. It lies on the west bank of the Rhine, opposite Dusseldorf. Founded about 12 BC as a Roman fortress (the ...
Neustadt an der Weinstrasse: city, Rhineland-Palatinate Land (state), southwestern Germany. It lies on the eastern slope of the Haardt Mountains, at the mouth of the Speyer-Bach. Founded in 1220 and chartered in 1275, its ...
neuston: group of organisms found on top of or attached to the underside of the surface film of water. The neuston includes insects such as whirligig beetles and water striders, some ...
Neustria: during the Merovingian period (6th-8th century) of early medieval Europe, the western Frankish kingdom, as distinct from Austrasia, the eastern kingdom. By derivation, Neustria was the "new" (French neuf; German ...
Neutra, Richard Joseph: Austrian-born American architect known for his role in introducing the International Style into American architecture.
Neutral: a confederacy of Iroquoian-speaking Indians who lived in what are now southern Ontario, western New York, northeastern Ohio, and southeastern Michigan. They received their name from the French because they ...
neutral monism: in the philosophy of mind, theories that hold that mind and body are not separate, distinct substances but are composed of the same sort of neutral "stuff."
neutralism: in international relations, the peacetime policy of avoiding political or ideological affiliations with major power blocs. The policy was pursued by such countries as India, Yugoslavia, and many of the ...
neutrality: the legal status arising from the abstention of a state from all participation in a war between other states, the maintenance of an attitude of impartiality toward the belligerents, and ...
neutrino: elementary subatomic particle with no electric charge, very little mass, and 12 unit of spin. Neutrinos belong to the family of particles called leptons, which are not subject to the ...
neutron: neutral subatomic particle that is a constituent of every atomic nucleus except ordinary hydrogen. It has no electric charge and a rest mass equal to 1.67495 × 10⁻²⁷ kg-marginally greater ...
neutron bomb: specialized type of small thermonuclear weapon that produces minimal blast and heat but which releases large amounts of lethal radiation. The neutron bomb delivers blast and heat effects that are ...
neutron capture: type of nuclear reaction in which a target nucleus absorbs a neutron (uncharged particle), then emits a discrete quantity of electromagnetic energy (gamma-ray photon). The target nucleus and the product ...