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phala: (Sanskrit: "fruit"), in Indian philosophy, the fruit or consequence of a particular action (karma). The almost universally held conviction among Indian philosophers that this life is but one in a ...
Phalaborwa: mining town, Northern province, South Africa, located east of the Drakensberg mountains and north of the Olifants River near Kruger National Park. It is built on top of an old ...
phalanger: any of several species of Australasian marsupial mammals. They are called possums in Australia and Tasmania.
phalanx: in military science, tactical formation consisting of a block of heavily armed infantry standing shoulder to shoulder in files several ranks deep. Fully developed by the ancient Greeks, it survived ...
Phalaris: tyrant of Acragas (modern Agrigento), Sicily, notorious for his cruelty. He is alleged to have roasted his victims alive in a bronze bull, their shrieks representing the animal's bellowing. A ...
phalarope: (Greek: "coot-foot"), any of three species of shorebirds that are part of the family Scolopacidae (order Charadriiformes). They are lightly built, slim-necked birds, about 15 to 25 cm (6 to ...
phallicism: worship of the generative principle as symbolized by the sexual organs or the act of sexual intercourse. Although religious activities that involve sexuality or the symbolism of the male or ...
Phalodi: city, Rajasthan state, northwestern India. Located in the Great Indian (Thar) Desert, Phalodi is an old caravan centre, believed to have been founded in the 15th century. Architectural monuments include ...
Pham Hung: Vietnamese politician who served briefly as prime minister (1987-88) and was the first southern Vietnamese to reach the highest level of the Communist Party Central Committee, the Politburo.
Phan Boi Chau: dominant personality of early Vietnamese resistance movements, whose impassioned writings and tireless schemes for independence earned him the reverence of his people as one of Vietnam's greatest patriots.
Phan Chau Trinh: nationalist leader and reformer who played a vital role in the movement for Vietnamese independence and who was the leading proponent of a reformist program that joined the aims of ...
Phan Dinh Phung: Vietnamese government official who opposed French expansion in Vietnam and became a leader of the nationalist resistance movement.
Phan Khoi: intellectual leader who inspired a North Vietnamese variety of the Chinese Hundred Flowers Campaign, in which scholars were permitted to criticize the Communist regime, but for which he himself was ...
Phan Thanh Gian: Vietnamese government official and diplomat whose conservatism and strict adherence to the political and ethical tenets of Confucianism may have contributed to the French conquest of Vietnam.
Phan Thiet: seaport, southern Vietnam. It lies along the South China Sea at the head of a broad crescent bay, 112 miles (180 km) east-northeast of Ho Chi Minh City (formerly Saigon). ...
Phanariote: member of one of the principal Greek families of the Phanar, the Greek quarter of Constantinople (Istanbul), who, as administrators in the civil bureaucracy, exercised great influence in the Ottoman ...
Phanerozoic Eon: the span of geologic time extending about 540 million years from the end of the Proterozoic Eon to the present. The Phanerozoic, the eon of visible life, is divided into ...
Phangnga: town, southern Thailand, on the hilly western side of the Malay Peninsula. It lies on the coastal road and is a centre for mining, trade, and tourism inspired by the ...
Phanias: also spelled Phaenias, or Phainias Greek philosopher of Eresus on the island of Lesbos, a pupil of Aristotle and a friend of Theophrastus, whom he joined in the Peripatetic school.
phantom midge: any insect of the family Chaoboridae (order Diptera), similar in appearance to the mosquito. The common name is derived from the fact that the larvae are almost transparent. Their antennae ...
Phao Sriyanond: director general of the Thai government's national police, who as one of a powerful triumvirate, with Luang Phibunsongkhram and Sarit Thanarat, built a formidable armed force in an unsuccessful attempt ...
pharaoh: (from Egyptian per 'aa, "great house"), originally, the royal palace in ancient Egypt; the word came to be used as a synonym for the Egyptian king under the New Kingdom ...
Pharisee: member of a Jewish religious party that flourished in Palestine during the latter part of the Second Temple period (515 BC-AD 70). Their insistence on the binding force of oral ...
pharmaceutical: substance used in the diagnosis, treatment, or prevention of disease and for restoring, correcting, or modifying organic functions.
pharmaceutical industry: complex of processes, operations, and organizations engaged in development and manufacture of drugs and medications.
pharmacology: branch of medicine that deals with the interaction of drugs with the systems and processes of living animals, in particular, the mechanisms of drug action as well as the therapeutic ...
pharmacopoeia: book published by a government, or otherwise under official sanction, to provide standards of strength and purity for therapeutic drugs. The primary function of a pharmacopoeia is to describe the ...
pharmacy: the science and art concerned with the preparation and standardization of drugs. Its scope includes the cultivation of plants that are used as drugs, the synthesis of chemical compounds of ...
Pharnabazus: Persian soldier and statesman who was the hereditary satrap (provincial governor) of Dascylium under Darius II and Artaxerxes II. Pharnabazus was an outstanding military and naval commander in Persia's wars ...
Pharos of Alexandria: one of the Seven Wonders of the World and the most famous lighthouse in antiquity. It was a technological triumph and is the archetype of all lighthouses since. Built by ...
Pharr: city, Hidalgo county, southern Texas, U.S., in the lower Rio Grande valley. It is one of several small cities in the area (including McAllen, San Juan, and Edinburg) with mixed ...
Pharsalus, Battle of: (48 BC), the decisive engagement in the ancient Roman civil war between Julius Caesar and Pompey. After Caesar had been defeated by Pompey at Dyrrhachium in 48 BC, both armies ...
pharyngitis: inflammatory illness of the mucous membranes and underlying structures of the throat (pharynx). Inflammation usually involves the nasopharynx, uvula, soft palate, and tonsils. The illness can be caused by bacteria, ...
pharynx: (Greek: "throat"), a cone-shaped passageway leading from the oral and nasal cavities in the head to the esophagus and larynx. The pharynx chamber serves both respiratory and digestive functions. Thick ...
phase: in thermodynamics, chemically and physically uniform or homogeneous quantity of matter that can be separated mechanically from a nonhomogeneous mixture and that may consist of a single substance or of ...
phase: in thermodynamics, chemically and physically uniform or homogeneous quantity of matter that can be separated mechanically from a nonhomogeneous mixture and that may consist of a single substance or of ...
phase: in mechanics of vibrations, the fraction of a period (i.e., the time required to complete a full cycle) that a point completes after last passing through the reference, or zero, ...
phase: in astronomy, any of the varying appearances of a celestial body as different amounts of its disk are seen (from the Earth, ordinarily) to be illuminated by the Sun. The ...
phase diagram: graph showing the limiting conditions for solid, liquid, and gaseous phases of a single substance or of a mixture of substances while undergoing changes in pressure and temperature or in ...
phase rule: law relating variables of a system in thermodynamic equilibrium, deduced by the American physicist J. Willard Gibbs in his papers on thermodynamics (1875-78). Systems in thermodynamic equilibrium are generally considered ...
Phasianidae: the pheasant family, a bird family (order Galliformes) that includes among its members the jungle fowl, partridge, peacock, pheasant, and quail (qq.v.).
Phatthalung: town, southern Thailand, situated in a large fertile plain 45 miles (72 km) northeast of Songkhla. It lies on the Bangkok-Singapore rail line. The area is planted largely in rice ...
Phaulkon, Constantine: Greek adventurer who became one of the most audacious and prominent figures in the history of 17th-century European relations with Southeast Asia.
Phayao: town, northern Thailand, lying in a mountainous region on the watershed between the Mekong and Chao Phraya river systems. Phayao is located on a scenic mountain lake that empties into ...
Phayre, Sir Arthur Purves: British commissioner in Burma (Myanmar), who made a novel attempt to spread European education through traditional Burmese institutions.
pheasant: any bird of the family Phasianidae (order Galliformes) that is larger than a quail or partridge. Most pheasants-some 50 species in about 16 genera of the subfamily Phasianinae-are long-tailed birds ...
pheasant's-eye: (species Adonis annua), annual herbaceous plant of the buttercup family (Ranunculaceae) native to Eurasia and grown in garden borders and for cut flowers. It is 20 to 40 cm (8 ...
Pheidon: king of Argos, Argolis, who made his city an important power in the Peloponnese, Greece.
Phek: town, southern Nagaland state, northeastern India, 75 miles (121 km) east of Kohima town. It is a rural town whose inhabitants practice shifting cultivation. Weaving is the important cottage industry. ...
Phelps, Almira Hart Lincoln: 19th-century American educator and writer who strove to raise the academic standards of education for girls.
Phelps, Michael: American swimmer, who won a record eight swimming medals at the 2004 Olympic Games in Athens.
Phelps, Samuel: British actor and manager, one of the most famous actors of the 19th century.
Phelps, William Lyon: American scholar and critic who did much to popularize the teaching of contemporary literature.
Phenacodus: extinct genus of primitive mammals known from fossils of the Early Eocene Epoch (57.8 to 52 million years ago). Though too late in time to have been the ancestral form ...
phenakite: rare mineral, beryllium silicate, Be₂SiO₄, used as a gemstone. Phenakite has long been known from the emerald and chrysoberyl mine on the Takovaya River, near Yekaterinburg (formerly Sverdlovsk), in the ...
Phenix City: city, Lee and Russell counties, seat (1935) of Russell county, eastern Alabama, U.S., about 25 miles (40 km) southeast of Opelika. The city is a port on the Chattahoochee River, ...
phenobarbital: barbiturate drug that became available in 1912, used in medicine as a sedative-hypnotic. See barbiturate.
phenol: any of a family of organic compounds characterized by a hydroxyl (&singlehorzbond;OH) group attached to a carbon atom that is part of an aromatic ring. Besides serving as the generic ...
phenolphthalein: an organic compound of the phthalein family that is widely employed as an acid-base indicator and as a laxative.
phenolsulfonphthalein test: clinical procedure for the estimation of overall blood flow through the kidney; the test is used only infrequently now. A specific dose of the PSP dye is injected intravenously, and ...
phenomenalism: a philosophical theory of perception and the external world. Its essential tenet is that propositions about material objects are reducible to propositions about actual and possible sensations, or sense data, ...
Phenomenology: a 20th-century philosophical movement, the primary objective of which is the direct investigation and description of phenomena as consciously experienced, without theories about their causal explanation and as free as ...
phenomenon: in philosophy, any object, fact, or occurrence perceived or observed. In general, phenomena are the objects of the senses (e.g., sights and sounds) as contrasted with what is apprehended by ...
phenothiazine: widely used anthelmintic (worming agent) in veterinary medicine. Phenothiazine is an organic compound effective against a broad range of parasites in cattle, horses, poultry, sheep, and swine. A highly toxic ...
phenotype: all the observable characteristics of an organism, such as shape, size, colour, and behaviour, that result from the interaction of its genotype (total genetic inheritance) with the environment. The common ...
phenylalanine: an amino acid present in the mixture obtained upon hydrolysis of common proteins. Human hemoglobin (the oxygen-carrying pigment of red blood cells) is one of the richest sources of phenylalanine, ...
phenylketonuria: hereditary inability of the body to normally metabolize the amino acid phenylalanine. Phenylalanine is normally converted in the human body to tyrosine, another amino acid, by a specific organic catalyst, ...
phenylthiocarbamide tasting: a genetically controlled ability to taste phenylthiocarbamide (PTC) and a number of related substances, all of which have some antithyroid activity. PTC-tasting ability is a simple genetic trait governed by ...
pheochromocytoma: tumour, most often nonmalignant, that causes abnormally high blood pressure because of hypersecretion of the hormones epinephrine and norepinephrine. Usually the tumour is in the medullary cells of the adrenal ...
Pherecydes Of Syros: Greek mythographer and cosmogonist traditionally associated with the Seven Wise Men of Greece (especially Thales).
pheromone: any endogenous chemical secreted in minute amounts by an organism in order to elicit a particular reaction from another organism of the same species. Pheromones are widespread among insects and ...
Phetchaburi: town, south-central Thailand, located in the northern portion of the Malay Peninsula. It lies 65 miles (105 km) southwest of Bangkok. Phetchaburi is located near the mouth of the Phet ...
Phetracha: king of the Tai kingdom of Ayutthaya, or Siam (ruled 1688-1703), whose policies reduced European trade and influence in the country and helped preserve its independence.
Phetsarath Ratanavongsa, Prince: Lao nationalist and political leader, who is regarded as the founder of Lao independence.
Phibunsongkhram, Luang: field marshal and premier of Thailand in 1938-44 and 1948-57, who was associated with the rise of authoritarian military governments in Thailand.
Phidias: Athenian sculptor, the artistic director of the construction of the Parthenon, who created its most important religious images and supervised and probably designed its overall sculptural decoration. It is said ...