1.
Dracaena draco
–
Not to be confused with the related Dracaena cinnabari, the dragon blood tree native to Socotra. It is the symbol of the island of Tenerife, together with the blue chaffinch. Dracaena draco is a monocot with a growth habit currently placed in the asparagus family. When young it has a single stem, at about 10–15 years of age the stem stops growing and produces a first flower spike with white, lily-like perfumed flowers, followed by coral berries. Soon a crown of terminal buds appears and the plant starts branching, each branch grows for about 10–15 years and re-branches, so a mature plant has an umbrella-like habit. It grows slowly, requiring ten years to reach 1.2 metres in height. Being a monocotyledon, it does not display any annual or growth rings so the age of the tree can only be estimated by the number of branching points before reaching the canopy. The specimen called El Drago Milenario growing at Icod de los Vinos in northwest Tenerife is the oldest living plant of this species and its age was estimated in 1975 to be around 250 years, with a maximum of 365 years, not several thousand as had previously been claimed. It is also the largest D. draco tree alive and its massive trunk comes from the contribution of clusters of aerial roots that emerge from the bases of lowest branches and grow down to the soil. Descending along the trunk, they cling tightly to the trunk, integrate with it, there is considerable genetic variation within the Canary Island dragon trees. The form found on Gran Canaria is now treated as a species, Dracaena tamaranae. The form endemic to La Palma initially branches very low with numerous, there is a forest of such trees at Las Tricias, Garafia district, La Palma. When the bark or leaves are cut they secrete a reddish resin, dragons blood has a number of traditional medical uses, although dragons blood obtained from Dracaena draco was not known until the 15th century. The Guanches worshiped a specimen in Tenerife, and hollowed its trunk into a small sanctuary, humboldt saw it at the time of his visit. It was 70 feet tall and 45 feet in circumference, and was estimated to be 6000 years old and it was destroyed by a storm in 1868. Dracaena draco is cultivated and widely available as a tree for parks, gardens. It has gained the Royal Horticultural Societys Award of Garden Merit, list of animals and plants symbols of the Canary Islands Wildlife of Cape Verde#Flora Arkive, Dracaena draco factsheet. Benabid, A. & Cuzin, F. Dragon tree populations in Morocco, comptes Rendus de lAcademie des Sciences Serie III Sciences de la Vie 320, 267-277
2.
Conservation status
–
The conservation status of a group of organisms indicates whether the group still exists and how likely the group is to become extinct in the near future. Various systems of conservation status exist and are in use at international, multi-country, the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species is the best known worldwide conservation status listing and ranking system. Also included are species that have gone extinct since 500 AD, when discussing the IUCN Red List, the official term threatened is a grouping of three categories, critically endangered, endangered, and vulnerable. Widespread and abundant taxa are included in this category, Data deficient – Not enough data to make an assessment of its risk of extinction Not evaluated – Has not yet been evaluated against the criteria. The Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora aims to ensure that trade in specimens of wild animals. Many countries require CITES permits when importing plants and animals listed on CITES, in the European Union, the Birds and Habitats Directives are the legal instruments that evaluate the conservation status within the EU of species and habitats. NatureServe conservation status focuses on Latin America, United States, Canada, and it has been developed by scientists from NatureServe, The Nature Conservancy, and the network of natural heritage programs and data centers. It is increasingly integrated with the IUCN Red List system and its categories for species include, presumed extinct, possibly extinct, critically imperiled, imperiled, vulnerable, apparently secure, and secure. The system also allows ambiguous or uncertain ranks including inexact numeric ranks, NatureServe adds a qualifier for captive or cultivated only, which has a similar meaning to the IUCN Red List extinct in the wild status. The Red Data Book of the Russian Federation is used within the Russian Federation, in Australia, the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999 describes lists of threatened species, ecological communities and threatening processes. The categories resemble those of the 1994 IUCN Red List Categories & Criteria, prior to the EPBC Act, a simpler classification system was used by the Endangered Species Protection Act 1992. Some state and territory governments also have their own systems for conservation status, in Belgium, the Flemish Research Institute for Nature and Forest publishes an online set of more than 150 nature indicators in Dutch. In Canada, the Committee on the Status of Endangered Wildlife in Canada is a group of experts that assesses and designates which wild species are in danger of disappearing from Canada. Under the Species at Risk Act, it is up to the federal government, in China, the State, provinces and some counties have determined their key protected wildlife species. There is the China red data book, in Finland, a large number of species are protected under the Nature Conservation Act, and through the EU Habitats Directive and EU Birds Directive. In Germany, the Federal Agency for Nature Conservation publishes red lists of endangered species, india has the Wild Life Protection Act,1972, Amended 2003 and the Biological Diversity Act,2002. In Japan, the Ministry of Environment publishes a Threatened Wildlife of Japan Red Data Book, in the Netherlands, the Dutch Ministry of Agriculture, Nature and Food Quality publishes a list of threatened species, and conservation is enforced by the Nature Conservation Act 1998. Species are also protected through the Wild Birds and Habitats Directives, in New Zealand, the Department of Conservation publishes the New Zealand Threat Classification System lists
3.
Vulnerable species
–
Vulnerability is mainly caused by habitat loss or destruction of the species home. Vulnerable habitat or species are monitored and can become increasingly threatened, some species listed as vulnerable may be common in captivity, an example being the military macaw. There are currently 5196 animals and 6789 plants classified as vulnerable, compared with 1998 levels of 2815 and 3222, practices such as Cryoconservation of animal genetic resources have been enforced in efforts to conserve vulnerable breeds of livestock specifically. The International Union for Conservation of Nature uses several criteria to enter species in this category, a reduction of at least 20%, projected or suspected to be met within the next ten years or three generations, whichever is the longer, based on any of, or above. Population is characterised by a restriction in its area of occupancy or in the number of locations. E) Quantitative analysis showing the probability of extinction in the wild is at least 10% within 100 years
4.
IUCN Red List
–
The IUCN Red List of Threatened Species, founded in 1964, is the worlds most comprehensive inventory of the global conservation status of biological species. The International Union for Conservation of Nature is the main authority on the conservation status of species. A series of Regional Red Lists are produced by countries or organizations, the IUCN Red List is set upon precise criteria to evaluate the extinction risk of thousands of species and subspecies. These criteria are relevant to all species and all regions of the world, the aim is to convey the urgency of conservation issues to the public and policy makers, as well as help the international community to try to reduce species extinction. Major species assessors include BirdLife International, the Institute of Zoology, the World Conservation Monitoring Centre, collectively, assessments by these organizations and groups account for nearly half the species on the Red List. The IUCN aims to have the category of every species re-evaluated every five years if possible, the 1964 IUCN Red List of Threatened Plants used the older pre-criteria Red List assessment system. Plants listed may not, therefore, appear in the current Red List, IUCN advise that is best to check both the online Red List and the 1997 plants Red List publication. The 2006 Red List, released on 4 May 2006 evaluated 40,168 species as a whole, plus an additional 2,160 subspecies, varieties, aquatic stocks, on 12 September 2007, the World Conservation Union released the 2007 IUCN Red List of Threatened Species. Russ Mittermeier, chief of Swiss-based IUCNs Primate Specialist Group, stated that 16,306 species are endangered with extinction,188 more than in 2006, the Red List includes the Sumatran orangutan in the Critically Endangered category and the Bornean orangutan in the Endangered category. The study shows at least 1,141 of the 5,487 mammals on Earth are known to be threatened with extinction, and 836 are listed as Data Deficient. The Red List of 2012 was released 19 July 2012 at Rio+20 Earth Summit, nearly 2,000 species were added, the IUCN assessed a total of 63,837 species which revealed 19,817 are threatened with extinction. With 3,947 described as endangered and 5,766 as endangered. At threat are 41% of amphibian species, 33% of reef-building corals, 30% of conifers, 25% of mammals, the IUCN Red List has listed 132 species of plants and animals from India as Critically Endangered. Extinct – No known individuals remaining, extinct in the wild – Known only to survive in captivity, or as a naturalized population outside its historic range. Critically endangered – Extremely high risk of extinction in the wild, Endangered – High risk of extinction in the wild. Vulnerable – High risk of endangerment in the wild, near threatened – Likely to become endangered in the near future. Does not qualify for a more at-risk category, widespread and abundant taxa are included in this category. Data deficient – Not enough data to make an assessment of its risk of extinction, Not evaluated – Has not yet been evaluated against the criteria
5.
Taxonomy (biology)
–
Taxonomy is the science of defining groups of biological organisms on the basis of shared characteristics and giving names to those groups. The exact definition of taxonomy varies from source to source, but the core of the remains, the conception, naming. There is some disagreement as to whether biological nomenclature is considered a part of taxonomy, the broadest meaning of taxonomy is used here. The word taxonomy was introduced in 1813 by Candolle, in his Théorie élémentaire de la botanique, the term alpha taxonomy is primarily used today to refer to the discipline of finding, describing, and naming taxa, particularly species. In earlier literature, the term had a different meaning, referring to morphological taxonomy, ideals can, it may be said, never be completely realized. They have, however, a value of acting as permanent stimulants. Some of us please ourselves by thinking we are now groping in a beta taxonomy, turrill thus explicitly excludes from alpha taxonomy various areas of study that he includes within taxonomy as a whole, such as ecology, physiology, genetics, and cytology. He further excludes phylogenetic reconstruction from alpha taxonomy, thus, Ernst Mayr in 1968 defined beta taxonomy as the classification of ranks higher than species. This activity is what the term denotes, it is also referred to as beta taxonomy. How species should be defined in a group of organisms gives rise to practical and theoretical problems that are referred to as the species problem. The scientific work of deciding how to define species has been called microtaxonomy, by extension, macrotaxonomy is the study of groups at higher taxonomic ranks, from subgenus and above only, than species. While some descriptions of taxonomic history attempt to date taxonomy to ancient civilizations, earlier works were primarily descriptive, and focused on plants that were useful in agriculture or medicine. There are a number of stages in scientific thinking. Early taxonomy was based on criteria, the so-called artificial systems. Later came systems based on a complete consideration of the characteristics of taxa, referred to as natural systems, such as those of de Jussieu, de Candolle and Bentham. The publication of Charles Darwins Origin of Species led to new ways of thinking about classification based on evolutionary relationships and this was the concept of phyletic systems, from 1883 onwards. This approach was typified by those of Eichler and Engler, the advent of molecular genetics and statistical methodology allowed the creation of the modern era of phylogenetic systems based on cladistics, rather than morphology alone. Taxonomy has been called the worlds oldest profession, and naming and classifying our surroundings has likely been taking place as long as mankind has been able to communicate
6.
Plant
–
Plants are mainly multicellular, predominantly photosynthetic eukaryotes of the kingdom Plantae. The term is generally limited to the green plants, which form an unranked clade Viridiplantae. This includes the plants, conifers and other gymnosperms, ferns, clubmosses, hornworts, liverworts, mosses and the green algae. Green plants have cell walls containing cellulose and obtain most of their energy from sunlight via photosynthesis by primary chloroplasts and their chloroplasts contain chlorophylls a and b, which gives them their green color. Some plants are parasitic and have lost the ability to produce amounts of chlorophyll or to photosynthesize. Plants are characterized by sexual reproduction and alternation of generations, although reproduction is also common. There are about 300–315 thousand species of plants, of which the great majority, green plants provide most of the worlds molecular oxygen and are the basis of most of Earths ecologies, especially on land. Plants that produce grains, fruits and vegetables form humankinds basic foodstuffs, Plants play many roles in culture. They are used as ornaments and, until recently and in variety, they have served as the source of most medicines. The scientific study of plants is known as botany, a branch of biology, Plants are one of the two groups into which all living things were traditionally divided, the other is animals. The division goes back at least as far as Aristotle, who distinguished between plants, which generally do not move, and animals, which often are mobile to catch their food. Much later, when Linnaeus created the basis of the system of scientific classification. Since then, it has become clear that the plant kingdom as originally defined included several unrelated groups, however, these organisms are still often considered plants, particularly in popular contexts. When the name Plantae or plant is applied to a group of organisms or taxon. The evolutionary history of plants is not yet settled. Those which have been called plants are in bold, the way in which the groups of green algae are combined and named varies considerably between authors. Algae comprise several different groups of organisms which produce energy through photosynthesis, most conspicuous among the algae are the seaweeds, multicellular algae that may roughly resemble land plants, but are classified among the brown, red and green algae. Each of these groups also includes various microscopic and single-celled organisms
7.
Flowering plant
–
The flowering plants, also known as Angiospermae or Magnoliophyta, are the most diverse group of land plants, with 416 families, approx. 13,164 known genera and a total of c.295,383 known species, etymologically, angiosperm means a plant that produces seeds within an enclosure, in other words, a fruiting plant. The term angiosperm comes from the Greek composite word meaning enclosed seeds, the ancestors of flowering plants diverged from gymnosperms in the Triassic Period, during the range 245 to 202 million years ago, and the first flowering plants are known from 160 mya. They diversified extensively during the Lower Cretaceous, became widespread by 120 mya, angiosperms differ from other seed plants in several ways, described in the table. These distinguishing characteristics taken together have made the angiosperms the most diverse and numerous land plants, the amount and complexity of tissue-formation in flowering plants exceeds that of gymnosperms. The vascular bundles of the stem are arranged such that the xylem and phloem form concentric rings, in the dicotyledons, the bundles in the very young stem are arranged in an open ring, separating a central pith from an outer cortex. In each bundle, separating the xylem and phloem, is a layer of meristem or active formative tissue known as cambium, the soft phloem becomes crushed, but the hard wood persists and forms the bulk of the stem and branches of the woody perennial. Among the monocotyledons, the bundles are more numerous in the stem and are scattered through the ground tissue. They contain no cambium and once formed the stem increases in diameter only in exceptional cases, the characteristic feature of angiosperms is the flower. Flowers show remarkable variation in form and elaboration, and provide the most trustworthy external characteristics for establishing relationships among angiosperm species, the function of the flower is to ensure fertilization of the ovule and development of fruit containing seeds. The floral apparatus may arise terminally on a shoot or from the axil of a leaf, occasionally, as in violets, a flower arises singly in the axil of an ordinary foliage-leaf. There are two kinds of cells produced by flowers. Microspores, which divide to become pollen grains, are the male cells and are borne in the stamens. The female cells called megaspores, which divide to become the egg cell, are contained in the ovule. The flower may consist only of parts, as in willow. Usually, other structures are present and serve to protect the sporophylls, the individual members of these surrounding structures are known as sepals and petals. The outer series is usually green and leaf-like, and functions to protect the rest of the flower, the inner series is, in general, white or brightly colored, and is more delicate in structure. It functions to attract insect or bird pollinators, attraction is effected by color, scent, and nectar, which may be secreted in some part of the flower
8.
Monocotyledon
–
Monocotyledons, commonly referred to as monocots, are flowering plants whose seeds typically contain only one embryonic leaf, or cotyledon. However, molecular research has shown that while the monocots form a monophyletic group or clade. Monocots have almost always recognized as a group, but with various taxonomic ranks. The APG III system of 2009 recognises a clade called monocots, the monocots include about 60,000 species. The largest family in this group by number of species are the orchids, about half as many species belong to the true grasses, which are economically the most important family of monocots. In agriculture the majority of the biomass produced comes from monocots and these include not only major grains, but also forage grasses, sugar cane, and the bamboos. Other economically important monocot crops include various palms, bananas, gingers and their relatives, turmeric and cardamom, asparagus and the onions and garlic family. Additionally most of the bulbs, plants cultivated for their blooms, such as lilies, daffodils, irises, amaryllis, cannas, bluebells. The monocots or monocotyledons have, as the name implies, a single cotyledon, or embryonic leaf, from a diagnostic point of view the number of cotyledons is neither a particularly useful characteristic, nor is it completely reliable. Nevertheless, monocots are sufficiently distinctive that there has rarely been disagreement as to membership of this group, however, morphological features that reliably characterise major clades are rare. Thus monocots are distinguishable from other angiosperms both in terms of their uniformity and diversity, although largely herbaceous, some arboraceous monocots reach great height, length and mass. The latter include agaves, palms, pandans, and bamboos and this creates challenges in water transport that monocots deal with in various ways. Some such as species of Yucca develop anomalous secondary growth, while palm trees, the axis undergoes primary thickening, that progresses from internode to internode, resulting in a typical inverted conical shape of the basal primary axis. The limited conductivity also contributes to limited branching of the stems, despite these limitations a wide variety of adaptive growth forms has resulted from epiphytic orchids and bromeliads to submarine Alismatales and mycotrophic Burmanniaceae and Triuridaceae. Other monocots, particularly Poales have adopted a life form. Leaves The cotyledon, the primordial Angiosperm leaf consists of a proximal leaf base or hypophyll, in moncots the hypophyll tends to be the dominant part in contrast to other angiosperms. Mature monocot leaves are narrow and linear, forming a sheathing around the stem at its base. There is usually only one leaf per node because the leaf base encompasses more than half the circumference, the evolution of this monocot characteristic has been attributed to developmental differences in early zonal differentiation rather than meristem activity
9.
Asparagales
–
Asparagales is an order of plants in modern classification systems such as the Angiosperm Phylogeny Group and the Angiosperm Phylogeny Web. The order takes its name from the type family Asparagaceae and is placed in the monocots amongst the lilioid monocots, the order has only recently been recognized in classification systems. It was first put forward by Huber in 1977 and later taken up in the Dahlgren system of 1985 and then the APG in 1998,2003 and 2009. Before this, many of its families were assigned to the old order Liliales, DNA sequence analysis indicated that many of the taxa previously included in Liliales should actually be redistributed over three orders, Liliales, Asparagales and Dioscoreales. The boundaries of the Asparagales and of its families have undergone a series of changes in recent years, future research may lead to further changes and ultimately greater stability. In the APG circumscription, Asparagales is the largest order of monocots with 14 families,1,122 genera, the order is clearly circumscribed on the basis of molecular phylogenetics, but is difficult to define morphologically, since its members are structurally diverse. Most species of Asparagales are herbaceous perennials, although some are climbers, the order also contains many geophytes. According to telomere sequence, at least two evolutionary switch-points happened within the order, basal sequence is formed by TTTAGGG like in majority of higher plants. Basal motif was changed to vertebrate-like TTAGGG and finally the most divergent motif CTCGGTTATGGG appears in Allium, one of the defining characteristics of the order is the presence of phytomelanin, a black pigment present in the seed coat, creating a dark crust. Phytomelanin is found in most families of the Asparagales, the leaves of almost all species form a tight rosette, either at the base of the plant or at the end of the stem, but occasionally along the stem. The flowers are not particularly distinctive, being lily type, with six tepals, from an economic point of view, the order Asparagales is second in importance within the monocots to the order Poales. Species are used as food and flavourings, as cut flowers, and as garden ornamentals. Thus although most species in the order are herbaceous, some no more than 15 cm high, there are a number of climbers, as well as several genera forming trees, succulent genera occur in several families. Almost all species have a cluster of leaves, either at the base of the plant or at the end of a more-or-less woody stem as with Yucca. In some cases the leaves are produced along the stem, the flowers are in the main not particularly distinctive, being of a general lily type, with six tepals, either free or fused from the base and up to six stamina. They are frequently clustered at the end of the plant stem and they are generally geophytes, but with linear leaves, and a lack of fine reticular venation. The seeds characteristically have the external epidermis either obliterated, or if present, have a layer of black carbonaceous phytomelanin in species with dry fruits. The inner part of the coat is generally collapsed, in contrast to Liliales whose seeds have a well developed outer epidermis, lack phytomelanin
10.
Asparagaceae
–
Asparagaceae is a family of flowering plants, placed in the order Asparagales of the monocots. In earlier classification systems, the species involved were often treated as belonging to the family Liliaceae, the revised APG III system of 2009 allows only the broader sense. A paper published at the time proposed seven subfamilies to correspond to the originally separate families. Unless otherwise noted, the alphabetical list below is based on genera accepted by the World Checklist of Selected Plant Families as in the family Asparagaceae, the reference against the subfamily name is to the source which places the genus in that subfamily. Asparagaceae in L. Watson and M. J. Dallwitz, the families of flowering plants, descriptions, illustrations, identification, information retrieval. Https, //web. archive. org/web/20070103200438/http, //delta-intkey. com, 80/ Liliaceae in Flora of North America NCBI Taxonomy Browser links at CSDL, Texas
11.
Nolinoideae
–
Nolinoideae is a monocot subfamily of the family Asparagaceae in the APG III system of 2009. It used to be treated as a family, Ruscaceae s. l. The family name is derived from the name of the type genus. The subfamily includes genera that had placed in a range of different families. Like many groups of monocots, the genera included here were once included in a wide interpretation of the family Liliaceae. A possibly incomplete list of the genera included in the Nolinoideae is given below, the reference is to the source which places the genus in this subfamily. The genera included here have varied widely in their limits and assignment to families and subfamilies, convallariaceae, Dracaenaceae, Eriospermaceae, Nolinaceae, Ruscaceae in L. Watson and M. J. Dallwitz. The families of flowering plants, descriptions, illustrations, identification, information retrieval, http, //delta-intkey. com Liliaceae in Flora of North America NCBI Taxonomy Browser links, links, links, linkslinks at CSDL, Texas
12.
Dracaena (plant)
–
Dracaena Dracaena arborea – tree dracaena Dracaena aubryana Brongn. – ribbon dracaena, marketed as lucky bamboo Dracaena camerooniana Baker Dracaena cincta Dracaena cinnabari Balf. f, – Socotra dragon tree Dracaena concinna Kunth Dracaena draco L. – Canary Islands dragon tree Dracaena ellenbeckiana - Kedong Dracaena Dracaena elliptica Dracaena fragrans Ker Gawl. – Pleomele dracaena or Song of India Dracaena serrulata Baker – Yemen dragon tree Dracaena surculosa Lindl, – spotted or gold dust dracaena. Formerly D. godseffiana Dracaena tamaranae – Gran Canaria dragon tree Dracaena umbraculifera Jacq, asparagus asparagoides Druce Cordyline australis Endl. Cordyline obtecta Baker Cordyline stricta Endl, liriope graminifolia Baker Lomandra filiformis Britten Some shrubby species, such as D. deremensis, D. fragrans, D. godseffiana, D. marginata, and D. braunii, are popular as houseplants. Many of these are toxic to pets, though not humans, rooted stem cuttings of D. braunii are widely marketed in the U. S. A. and the UK as lucky bamboo, although only superficially resembling true bamboos. A bright red resin, dragons blood, is produced from D. draco and, in ancient times, modern dragons blood is however more likely to be from the unrelated Daemonorops rattan palms. Media related to Dracaena at Wikimedia Commons Data related to Dracaena at Wikispecies Socotra botany
13.
Binomial nomenclature
–
Such a name is called a binomial name, a binomen, binominal name or a scientific name, more informally it is also called a Latin name. The first part of the name identifies the genus to which the species belongs, for example, humans belong to the genus Homo and within this genus to the species Homo sapiens. The formal introduction of system of naming species is credited to Carl Linnaeus. But Gaspard Bauhin, in as early as 1623, had introduced in his book Pinax theatri botanici many names of genera that were adopted by Linnaeus. Although the general principles underlying binomial nomenclature are common to these two codes, there are differences, both in the terminology they use and in their precise rules. Similarly, both parts are italicized when a binomial name occurs in normal text, thus the binomial name of the annual phlox is now written as Phlox drummondii. In scientific works, the authority for a name is usually given, at least when it is first mentioned. In zoology Patella vulgata Linnaeus,1758, the original name given by Linnaeus was Fringilla domestica, the parentheses indicate that the species is now considered to belong in a different genus. The ICZN does not require that the name of the person who changed the genus be given, nor the date on which the change was made, in botany Amaranthus retroflexus L. – L. is the standard abbreviation used in botany for Linnaeus. – Linnaeus first named this bluebell species Scilla italica, Rothmaler transferred it to the genus Hyacinthoides, the ICN does not require that the dates of either publication be specified. Prior to the adoption of the binomial system of naming species. Together they formed a system of polynomial nomenclature and these names had two separate functions. First, to designate or label the species, and second, to be a diagnosis or description, such polynomial names may sometimes look like binomials, but are significantly different. For example, Gerards herbal describes various kinds of spiderwort, The first is called Phalangium ramosum, Branched Spiderwort, is aptly termed Phalangium Ephemerum Virginianum, Soon-Fading Spiderwort of Virginia. The Latin phrases are short descriptions, rather than identifying labels, the Bauhins, in particular Caspar Bauhin, took some important steps towards the binomial system, by pruning the Latin descriptions, in many cases to two words. The adoption by biologists of a system of binomial nomenclature is due to Swedish botanist and physician Carl von Linné. It was in his 1753 Species Plantarum that he first began using a one-word trivial name together with a generic name in a system of binomial nomenclature. This trivial name is what is now known as an epithet or specific name
14.
Isaac Bayley Balfour
–
Sir Isaac Bayley Balfour, FRS, FRSE was a Scottish botanist. He was the son of John Hutton Balfour, also a botanist, and Marion Spottiswood Bayley and he was the cousin of Sir James Crichton-Browne. Balfour was educated at the Edinburgh Academy from 1864 to 1870, at this early stage his interests and abilities were in the biological sciences, which were taught to him by his father. Due to his fathers post as Professor of Botany at Edinburgh, Balfour studied at the University of Edinburgh, from which he graduated with first class honours in 1873, and at the universities in Warzburg and Strassburg. In 1874 Balfour participated in an expedition of 1874 to Rodrigues. He also went on to lead an expedition to Socotra in 1880, in 1884, he was appointed Sherardian Professor of Botany at the University of Oxford. In the same year he married Agnes Boyd Balloch and his father had greatly enlarged the botanical gardens during his tenure, but Balfour completely transformed them. He died at Court Hill, Haslemere in Surrey, balfours interest in Sino-Himalayan plants also put him in contact with botanist and plant collector Reginald Farrer. It was designed by Sir Robert Lorimer, with wooden panels using every variety of timber grown at Benmore and it also commemorated the contribution of James Duncan, a previous owner of the estate. In 1968 the Bayley Balfour Memorial Hut was restored, and moved to a new site in the garden of Benmore House. Schimper, Andreas Franz Wilhelm, William Rogers Fisher, Percy Groom, translation of Pflanzen-geographie auf physiologischer Grundlage by William Rogers Fisher, ed. Plant-geography Upon a Physiological Basis
15.
Socotra
–
Socotra, also spelled Soqotra, is an island and a small archipelago of four islands in the Arabian Sea. The territory is part of Yemen, and had long been a subdivision of the Aden Governorate, in 2004, it became attached to the Hadhramaut Governorate, which is much closer to the island than Aden. In 2013, the archipelago became its own governorate, the Soqatra Governorate, the island of Socotra constitutes around 95% of the landmass of the archipelago. It lies some 240 kilometres east of the Horn of Africa and 380 kilometres south of the Arabian Peninsula, the island is very isolated and a third of its plant life is found nowhere else on the planet. It has been described as the most alien-looking place on Earth, the island measures 132 kilometres in length and 49.7 kilometres in width. In the notes to his translation of the Periplus of the Erythraean Sea, huntingford remarks that the name Suqotra is not Greek in origin, but from the Sanskrit dvīpa sukhadhara. Another posited origin of the name is the Arabic suq meaning market, there was initially an Oldowan culture in Socotra. Oldowan stone tools were found in the area around Hadibo by V. A, zhukov, a member of the Russian Complex Expedition in 2008. Socotra appears as Dioskouridou in the Periplus of the Erythraean Sea, in 2001 a group of Belgian speleologists of the Socotra Karst Project investigated a cave on the island Socotra. There, they came across a number of inscriptions, drawings. Further investigation showed that these had left by sailors who visited the island between the 1st century BC and the 6th century AD. Most of the texts are written in the Indian Brāhmī script and this corpus of nearly 250 texts and drawings thus constitutes one of the main sources for the investigation of Indian Ocean trade networks in that time period. A local tradition holds that the inhabitants were converted to Christianity by Thomas the Apostle in AD52, in the 10th century, the Arab geographer Abu Muhammad al-Hasan al-Hamdani stated that in his time most of the inhabitants were Christians. They were Nestorians but also practised ancient magic rituals despite the warnings of their archbishop and he reported in a letter home that the tribesmen, due to lack of missionaries, had only retained a faint knowledge of Christianity. In 1507, a Portuguese fleet commanded by Tristão da Cunha with Afonso de Albuquerque landed at the capital of Suq. Their objective was to set a base in a place on the route to India. Tomás Fernandes started to build a fortress at Suq, the Forte de São Miguel de Socotorá, however, the infertility of the land led to famine and sickness in the garrison. Thus the Portuguese abandoned the island four years later, as it was not advantageous as a base, the islands passed under the control of the Mahra sultans in 1511, and its inhabitants were completely Islamized during their rule
16.
Yemen
–
Yemen, officially known as the Republic of Yemen, is an Arab country in Western Asia, occupying South Arabia, the southern end of the Arabian Peninsula. Yemen is the second-largest country in the peninsula, occupying 527,970 km2, the coastline stretches for about 2,000 km. It is bordered by Saudi Arabia to the north, the Red Sea to the west, the Gulf of Aden and Arabian Sea to the south, although Yemens constitutionally stated capital is the city of Sanaa, the city has been under rebel control since February 2015. Because of this, Yemens capital has been relocated to the port city of Aden. Yemens territory includes more than 200 islands, the largest of these is Socotra, Yemen was the home of the Sabaeans, a trading state that flourished for over a thousand years and probably also included parts of modern-day Ethiopia and Eritrea. In 275 AD, the region came under the rule of the later Jewish-influenced Himyarite Kingdom, Christianity arrived in the fourth century, whereas Judaism and local paganism were already established. Islam spread quickly in the century and Yemenite troops were crucial in the expansion of the early Islamic conquests. Administration of Yemen has long been notoriously difficult, several dynasties emerged from the ninth to 16th centuries, the Rasulid dynasty being the strongest and most prosperous. The country was divided between the Ottoman and British empires in the twentieth century. The Zaydi Mutawakkilite Kingdom of Yemen was established after World War I in North Yemen before the creation of the Yemen Arab Republic in 1962, South Yemen remained a British protectorate known as the Aden Protectorate until 1967 when it became an independent state and later, a Marxist state. The two Yemeni states united to form the modern republic of Yemen in 1990, Yemen is a developing country, and the poorest country in the Middle East. Under the rule of President Ali Abdullah Saleh, Yemen was described as a kleptocracy, according to the 2009 international corruption Perception Index by Transparency International, Yemen ranked 164 out of 182 countries surveyed. President Saleh stepped down and the powers of the presidency were transferred to Vice President Abd Rabbuh Mansur Hadi, the transitional process was disrupted by conflicts between the Houthis and al-Islah, as well as the al-Qaeda insurgency. In September 2014, the Houthis took over Sanaa, later declaring themselves in control of the government in a coup détat, since then, a Saudi-led intervention has taken place, however, it could not stop the civil war. Instead, the Saudis and the others have destroyed some hospitals, schools and homes, Yemen was mentioned in Old South Arabian inscriptions as Yamnat. In Arabic literature, the term includes much greater territory than that of the republic of Yemen. It stretches from the northern Asir Region in southwestern Saudi Arabia to Dhofar Governorate in southern Oman, one etymology derives Yemen from yumn, meaning felicity, as much of the country is fertile. The Romans called it Arabia Felix, as opposed to Arabia Deserta, al-Yaman significantly plays on the notion of the land to the right, when in Mecca facing the dawn, complementary to Al-Sham, the Land to the Left, referring to the Levant
17.
Arabian Sea
–
The Arabian Sea is a region of the northern Indian Ocean bounded on the north by Pakistan and Iran, on the west by northeastern Somalia and the Arabian Peninsula, and on the east by India. Historically the sea has been known by names including the Erythraean Sea. Its total area is 3,862,000 km2 and its depth is 4,652 metres. The Gulf of Aden is in the southwest, connecting the Arabian Sea to the Red Sea through the strait of Bab-el-Mandeb, the Arabian Sea has been crossed by important marine trade routes since the third or second millennium BCE. Major seaports include Jawaharlal Nehru Port in Mumbai, the Port of Karachi and the Gwadar Port in Pakistan, other important ports include in India, Kandla Port, and Mormugao in Goa. The largest islands in the Arabian Sea include Socotra, Masirah Island, Astola Island, the Arabian Seas surface area is about 3,862,000 km2. The maximum width of the Sea is approximately 2,400 km, the biggest river flowing into the Sea is the Indus River. There are also the gulfs of Khambhat and Kutch on the Indian coast, the countries with coastlines on the Arabian Sea are Somalia, Djibouti, Yemen, Oman, United Arab Emirates, Iran, Pakistan, India and the Maldives. There are several cities on the seas coast including Mumbai, Surat, Karachi, Gwadar, Pasni, Ormara, Aden, Muscat, Keti Bandar, Salalah, Duqm. International Hydrographic Organization defines the limits of the Arabian Sea as follows, the Eastern limit of the Gulf of Aden. A line joining Ràs al Hadd, East point of Arabia, a line running from the South extremity of Addu Atoll, to the Eastern extreme of Ràs Hafun. The Western limit of the Laccadive Sea, by the time of Julius Caesar, several well-established combined land-sea trade routes depended upon water transport through the Sea around the rough inland terrain features to its north. Each major route involved transhipping to pack animal caravan, travel through country and risk of bandits. Later the kingdom of Axum arose in Ethiopia to rule a mercantile empire rooted in the trade with Europe via Alexandria, Jawaharlal Nehru Port in Mumbai is the largest port in the Arabian Sea, and the largest container port in India. The Port of Karachi is Pakistans largest and busiest seaport, handling about 60% of the nations cargo and it is located between the Karachi towns of Kiamari and Saddar, close to the main business district and several industrial areas. The geographic position of the places it in close proximity to major shipping routes such as the Strait of Hormuz. The history of the port is intertwined with that of the city of Karachi, several ancient ports have been attributed in the area including Krokola, Morontobara, Barbarikon (the Periplus of the Erythraean Sea, and Debal. It warns sailors about whirlpools and advises them to safety in Kaurashi harbour if they found themselves drifting dangerously
18.
Dragon's blood
–
Dragons blood is a bright red resin that is obtained from different species of a number of distinct plant genera, Croton, Dracaena, Daemonorops, Calamus rotang and Pterocarpus. The red resin has been in use since ancient times as varnish, medicine, incense. A great degree of confusion existed for the ancients in regard to the source, some medieval encyclopedias claimed its source as the literal blood of elephants and dragons who had perished in mortal combat. The resin of Dracaena species, true dragons blood, and the very poisonous mineral cinnabar were often confused by the ancient Romans, in ancient China, little or no distinction was made among the types of dragons blood from the different species. Voyagers to the Canary Islands in the 15th century obtained dragons blood as dried garnet-red drops from Dracaena draco, the resin is exuded from its wounded trunk or branches. Dragons blood is obtained by the same method from Dracaena cinnabari. This resin was traded to ancient Europe via the Incense Road, Dragons blood resin is also produced from the rattan palms of the genus Daemonorops of the Indonesian islands and known there as jerang or djerang. It is gathered by breaking off the layer of red resin encasing the unripe fruit of the rattan, the collected resin is then rolled into solid balls before being sold. The red latex of the Sangre de Drago, aka Sangre de Grado, tree, has wound-healing and antioxidant properties, and has been used for centuries by native people. The dragons blood known to the ancient Romans was mostly collected from D. cinnabari, Socotra had been an important trading centre since at least the time of the Ptolemies. Dragons blood was used as a dye, painting pigment, and medicine in the Mediterranean basin, and was held by early Greeks, Romans, dioscorides and other early Greek writers described its medicinal uses. It was also used in ritual magic and alchemy. Dragons blood of both Dracaena draco and Dracaena cinnabari were used as a source of varnish for 18th century Italian violinmakers, there was also an 18th-century recipe for toothpaste that contained dragons blood. In modern times it is used as a varnish for violins, in photoengraving, as an incense resin. Dragons blood from both Daemonorops were used for ceremonies in India, sometimes Dracaena resin, but more often Daemonorops resin, was used in China as red varnish for wooden furniture. It was also used to colour the surface of writing paper for banners and posters, used especially for weddings and it is also added to red ink to make Dragons Blood Ink, which is used to inscribe magical seals and talismans. In folk medicine, dragons blood is used externally as a wash to promote healing of wounds and it is used internally for chest pains, post-partum bleeding, internal traumas and menstrual irregularities. In neopagan Witchcraft, it is used to increase the potency of spells for protection, love, banishing, in New Age shamanism it is used in ceremonies in a similar way as the neopagans use it
19.
Koko Crater Botanical Garden
–
The Koko Crater Botanical Garden is a botanical garden located within the Koko Crater on the eastern end of Oahu, Hawaii. It was given the title of the Charles M. Wills Cactus Garden by the Honolulu Department of Parks and Recreation, in recognition of his contributions to the garden. The garden is part of the Honolulu Botanical Gardens, and first established in 1958 and its hot, dry climate is suitable for Plumeria and Bougainvillea cultivars in the outer crater, kiawe and koa haole trees, and four major collections organized by region. Other collections include adeniums, alluaudias, aloes, baobabs, cacti, euphorbias, palms, a loop trail runs through the collections. They have About 500 trees and 200 species of trees, list of botanical gardens in the United States Koko Crater Botanical Garden
20.
Monocot
–
Monocotyledons, commonly referred to as monocots, are flowering plants whose seeds typically contain only one embryonic leaf, or cotyledon. However, molecular research has shown that while the monocots form a monophyletic group or clade. Monocots have almost always recognized as a group, but with various taxonomic ranks. The APG III system of 2009 recognises a clade called monocots, the monocots include about 60,000 species. The largest family in this group by number of species are the orchids, about half as many species belong to the true grasses, which are economically the most important family of monocots. In agriculture the majority of the biomass produced comes from monocots and these include not only major grains, but also forage grasses, sugar cane, and the bamboos. Other economically important monocot crops include various palms, bananas, gingers and their relatives, turmeric and cardamom, asparagus and the onions and garlic family. Additionally most of the bulbs, plants cultivated for their blooms, such as lilies, daffodils, irises, amaryllis, cannas, bluebells. The monocots or monocotyledons have, as the name implies, a single cotyledon, or embryonic leaf, from a diagnostic point of view the number of cotyledons is neither a particularly useful characteristic, nor is it completely reliable. Nevertheless, monocots are sufficiently distinctive that there has rarely been disagreement as to membership of this group, however, morphological features that reliably characterise major clades are rare. Thus monocots are distinguishable from other angiosperms both in terms of their uniformity and diversity, although largely herbaceous, some arboraceous monocots reach great height, length and mass. The latter include agaves, palms, pandans, and bamboos and this creates challenges in water transport that monocots deal with in various ways. Some such as species of Yucca develop anomalous secondary growth, while palm trees, the axis undergoes primary thickening, that progresses from internode to internode, resulting in a typical inverted conical shape of the basal primary axis. The limited conductivity also contributes to limited branching of the stems, despite these limitations a wide variety of adaptive growth forms has resulted from epiphytic orchids and bromeliads to submarine Alismatales and mycotrophic Burmanniaceae and Triuridaceae. Other monocots, particularly Poales have adopted a life form. Leaves The cotyledon, the primordial Angiosperm leaf consists of a proximal leaf base or hypophyll, in moncots the hypophyll tends to be the dominant part in contrast to other angiosperms. Mature monocot leaves are narrow and linear, forming a sheathing around the stem at its base. There is usually only one leaf per node because the leaf base encompasses more than half the circumference, the evolution of this monocot characteristic has been attributed to developmental differences in early zonal differentiation rather than meristem activity
21.
Dendrochronology
–
Dendrochronology is the scientific method of dating tree rings to the exact year they were formed in order to analyze atmospheric conditions during different periods in history. Dendrochronology is useful for determining the timing of events and rates of change in the environment and also in works of art and architecture, such as old panel paintings on wood, buildings and it is also used in radiocarbon dating to calibrate radiocarbon ages. New growth in trees occurs in a layer of cells near the bark, a trees growth rate changes in a predictable pattern throughout the year in response to seasonal climate changes, resulting in visible growth rings. Each ring marks a complete cycle of seasons, or one year, as of 2013, the oldest tree-ring measurements in the Northern Hemisphere extend back 13,900 years. Dendrochronology derives from Ancient Greek, δένδρον, meaning tree limb, χρόνος, meaning time, and -λογία, the Greek botanist Theophrastus first mentioned that the wood of trees has rings. In his Trattato della Pittura, Leonardo da Vinci was the first person to mention that trees form rings annually, in 1737, French investigators Henri-Louis Duhamel du Monceau and Georges-Louis Leclerc de Buffon examined the effect of growing conditions on the shape of tree rings. They found that in 1709, a severe winter produced a distinctly dark tree ring, the English polymath Charles Babbage proposed using dendrochronology to date the remains of trees in peat bogs or even in geological strata. During the latter half of the century, the scientific study of tree rings. In 1859, the German-American Jacob Kuechler used crossdating to examine oaks in order to study the record of climate in western Texas, in 1866, the German botanist, entomologist, and forester Julius Ratzeburg observed the effects on tree rings of defoliation caused by insect infestations. By 1882, this observation was already appearing in forestry textbooks, in the 1870s, the Dutch astronomer Jacobus C. Kapteyn was using crossdating to reconstruct the climates of the Netherlands, in 1881, the Swiss-Austrian forester Arthur von Seckendorff-Gudent was using crossdating. From 1869 to 1901, Robert Hartig, a German professor of forest pathology, wrote a series of papers on the anatomy, in 1892, the Russian physicist Fedor Nikiforovich Shvedov wrote that he had used patterns found in tree rings to predict droughts in 1882 and 1891. During the first half of the 20th century, the astronomer A. E. Douglass founded the Laboratory of Tree-Ring Research at the University of Arizona. Growth rings, also referred to as tree rings or annual rings, growth rings are the result of new growth in the vascular cambium, a layer of cells near the bark that is classified as a lateral meristem, this growth in diameter is known as secondary growth. Visible rings result from the change in speed through the seasons of the year, thus, critical for the title method. If the bark of the tree has been removed in a particular area, the rings are more visible in temperate zones, where the seasons differ more markedly. The inner portion of a ring is formed early in the growing season, when growth is comparatively rapid and is known as early wood. Many trees in temperate zones make one growth ring each year, hence, for the entire period of a trees life, a year-by-year record or ring pattern is formed that reflects the age of the tree and the climatic conditions in which the tree grew
22.
Herbivory
–
A herbivore is an animal anatomically and physiologically adapted to eating plant material, for example foliage, for the main component of its diet. As a result of their plant diet, herbivorous animals typically have mouthparts adapted to rasping or grinding, horses and other herbivores have wide flat teeth that are adapted to grinding grass, tree bark, and other tough plant material. A large percentage of herbivores have mutualistic gut flora that help them digest plant matter and this gut flora is made up of cellulose-digesting protozoans or bacteria living in the herbivores intestines. Herbivore is the form of a modern Latin coinage, herbivora. Richard Owen employed the term in an 1854 work on fossil teeth. Herbivora is derived from the Latin herba meaning a small plant or herb, Herbivory is a form of consumption in which an organism principally eats autotrophs such as plants, algae and photosynthesizing bacteria. More generally, organisms feed on autotrophs in general are known as primary consumers. Herbivory usually refers to eating plants, fungi, bacteria and protists that feed on living plants are usually termed plant pathogens. Flowering plants that obtain nutrition from other living plants are usually termed parasitic plants, there is however no single exclusive and definitive ecological classification of consumption patterns, each textbook has its own variations on the theme. Insects fed on the spores of early Devonian plants, and the Rhynie chert also provides evidence that organisms fed on plants using a pierce, during the next 75 million years, plants evolved a range of more complex organs, such as roots and seeds. There is no evidence of any organism being fed upon until the middle-late Mississippian,330.9 million years ago, further than their arthropod status, the identity of these early herbivores is uncertain. Hole feeding and skeletonisation are recorded in the early Permian, with surface fluid feeding evolving by the end of that period, Herbivory among four-limbed terrestrial vertebrates, the tetrapods developed in the Late Carboniferous. Early tetrapods were large amphibious piscivores, while amphibians continued to feed on fish and insects, some reptiles began exploring two new food types, tetrapods and plants. The entire dinosaur order ornithischia was composed with herbivores dinosaurs, carnivory was a natural transition from insectivory for medium and large tetrapods, requiring minimal adaptation. In contrast, a set of adaptations was necessary for feeding on highly fibrous plant materials. Arthropods evolved herbivory in four phases, changing their approach to it in response to changing plant communities, tetrapod herbivores made their first appearance in the fossil record of their jaws near the Permio-Carboniferous boundary, approximately 300 million years ago. The earliest evidence of their herbivory has been attributed to dental occlusion, the evolution of dental occlusion led to a drastic increase in plant food processing and provides evidence about feeding strategies based on tooth wear patterns. Examination of phylogenetic frameworks of tooth and jaw morphologes has revealed that dental occlusion developed independently in several lineages tetrapod herbivores and this suggests that evolution and spread occurred simultaneously within various lineages
23.
Seed dispersal
–
Seed dispersal is the movement or transport of seeds away from the parent plant. Plants have very limited mobility and consequently rely upon a variety of vectors to transport their propagules. Seeds can be dispersed away from the parent plant individually or collectively, there are five main modes of seed dispersal, gravity, wind, ballistic, water, and by animals. Some plants are serotinous and only disperse their seeds in response to an environmental stimulus, seed dispersal is likely to have several benefits for plant species. First, seed survival is often away from the parent plant. This higher survival may result from the actions of density-dependent seed and seedling predators and pathogens, competition with adult plants may also be lower when seeds are transported away from their parent. Seed dispersal also allows plants to reach specific habitats that are favorable for survival, for example, Ocotea endresiana is a tree species from Latin America which is dispersed by several species of birds, including the three-wattled bellbird. In the case of fleshy-fruited plants, seed-dispersal in animal guts often enhances the amount, the speed, and the asynchrony of germination, seeds dispersed by ants are not only dispersed short distances but are also buried underground by the ants. These seeds can thus avoid adverse effects such as fire or drought, reach nutrient-rich microsites. These features are peculiar to myrmecochory, which may provide additional benefits not present in other dispersal modes. Finally, at scale, seed dispersal may allow plants to colonize vacant habitats. In fact, recent evidence suggests that the majority of seed dispersal events involves more than one dispersal phase, seed dispersal is sometimes split into autochory and allochory. Autochorous plants disperse their seed without any help from an external vector, two other types of autochory not described in detail here are blastochory, where the stem of the plant crawls along the ground to deposit its seed far from the base of the plant, and herpochory. Barochory or the plant use of gravity for dispersal is a means of achieving seed dispersal. The effect of gravity on heavier fruits causes them to fall from the plant when ripe, fruits exhibiting this type of dispersal include apples, coconuts and passionfruit and those with harder shells. Gravity dispersal also allows for transmission by water or animal. Ballochory is a type of dispersal where the seed is ejected by explosive dehiscence of the fruit. Often the force that generates the results from turgor pressure within the fruit or due to internal tensions within the fruit
24.
Arecaceae
–
The Arecaceae are a botanical family of perennial climbers, shrubs, acaules and trees commonly known as palm trees. They are flowering plants, a family in the monocot order Arecales, currently 181 genera with around 2600 species are known, most of them restricted to tropical, subtropical, and warm temperate climates. Most palms are distinguished by their large, compound, evergreen leaves, known as fronds, however, palms exhibit an enormous diversity in physical characteristics and inhabit nearly every type of habitat within their range, from rainforests to deserts. Palms are among the best known and most extensively cultivated plant families and they have been important to humans throughout much of history. Many common products and foods are derived from palms, and palms are widely used in landscaping, making them one of the most economically important plants. In many historical cultures, palms were symbols for such ideas as victory, peace, for inhabitants of cooler climates today, palms symbolize the tropics and vacations. Whether as shrubs, trees, or vines, palms have two methods of growth, solitary or clustered, the common representation is that of a solitary shoot ending in a crown of leaves. This monopodial character may be exhibited by prostrate, trunkless, some common palms restricted to solitary growth include Washingtonia and Roystonea. Palms may instead grow in sparse though dense clusters, the trunk develops an axillary bud at a leaf node, usually near the base, from which a new shoot emerges. The new shoot, in turn, produces an axillary bud, exclusively sympodial genera include many of the rattans, Guihaia, and Rhapis. Several palm genera have both solitary and clustering members, Palms which are usually solitary may grow in clusters, and vice versa. These aberrations suggest the habit operates on a single gene, Palms have large, evergreen leaves that are either palmately or pinnately compound and spirally arranged at the top of the stem. The leaves have a sheath at the base that usually splits open on one side at maturity. The inflorescence is a spadix or spike surrounded by one or more bracts or spathes that become woody at maturity, the flowers are generally small and white, radially symmetric, and can be either uni- or bisexual. The sepals and petals usually number three each, and may be distinct or joined at the base, the stamens generally number six, with filaments that may be separate, attached to each other, or attached to the pistil at the base. The fruit is usually a single-seeded drupe but some genera may contain two or more seeds in each fruit, like all monocots, palms do not have the ability to increase the width of a stem via the same kind of vascular cambium found in non-monocot woody plants. This explains the shape of the trunk that is often seen in palms. The Arecaceae are notable among monocots for their height and for the size of their seeds, leaves, Ceroxylon quindiuense, Colombias national tree, is the tallest monocot in the world, reaching up to 60 m tall
25.
East India Company
–
The company also ruled the beginnings of the British Empire in India. The company received a Royal Charter from Queen Elizabeth I on 31 December 1600, wealthy merchants and aristocrats owned the Companys shares. Initially the government owned no shares and had only indirect control, during its first century of operation the focus of the Company was trade, not the building of an empire in India. The company eventually came to rule large areas of India with its own armies, exercising military power. Despite frequent government intervention, the company had recurring problems with its finances, the official government machinery of British India had assumed its governmental functions and absorbed its armies. Soon after the defeat of the Spanish Armada in 1588, London merchants presented a petition to Queen Elizabeth I for permission to sail to the Indian Ocean, one of them, Edward Bonventure, then sailed around Cape Comorin to the Malay Peninsula and returned to England in 1594. In 1596, three ships sailed east, however, these were all lost at sea. Two days later, on 24 September, the Adventurers reconvened and resolved to apply to the Queen for support of the project, the Adventurers convened again a year later. For a period of fifteen years the charter awarded the newly formed company a monopoly on trade with all countries east of the Cape of Good Hope and west of the Straits of Magellan. Anybody who traded in breach of the charter without a licence from the Company was liable to forfeiture of their ships and cargo, the governance of the company was in the hands of one governor and 24 directors or committees, who made up the Court of Directors. They, in turn, reported to the Court of Proprietors, ten committees reported to the Court of Directors. According to tradition, business was transacted at the Nags Head Inn, opposite St Botolphs church in Bishopsgate. Sir James Lancaster commanded the first East India Company voyage in 1601, in March 1604 Sir Henry Middleton commanded the second voyage. Early in 1608 Alexander Sharpeigh was appointed captain of the Companys Ascension, thereafter two ships, Ascension and Union sailed from Woolwich on 14 March 1607–8. Initially, the company struggled in the trade because of the competition from the already well-established Dutch East India Company. The company opened a factory in Bantam on the first voyage, the factory in Bantam was closed in 1683. During this time belonging to the company arriving in India docked at Surat. In the next two years, the company established its first factory in south India in the town of Machilipatnam on the Coromandel Coast of the Bay of Bengal
26.
Miocene
–
The Miocene is the first geological epoch of the Neogene Period and extends from about 23.03 to 5.333 million years ago. The Miocene was named by Sir Charles Lyell and its name comes from the Greek words μείων and καινός and means less recent because it has 18% fewer modern sea invertebrates than the Pliocene. The Miocene follows the Oligocene Epoch and is followed by the Pliocene Epoch, the earth went from the Oligocene through the Miocene and into the Pliocene, with the climate slowly cooling towards a series of ice ages. The Miocene boundaries are not marked by a single distinct global event, the apes arose and diversified during the Miocene, becoming widespread in the Old World. By the end of this epoch, the ancestors of humans had split away from the ancestors of the chimpanzees to follow their own evolutionary path, as in the Oligocene before it, grasslands continued to expand and forests to dwindle in extent. In the Miocene seas, kelp forests made their first appearance, the plants and animals of the Miocene were fairly modern. The Miocene faunal stages from youngest to oldest are typically named according to the International Commission on Stratigraphy, Two subdivisions each form the lower, middle, continents continued to drift toward their present positions. Mountain building took place in western North America, Europe, both continental and marine Miocene deposits are common worldwide with marine outcrops common near modern shorelines. Well studied continental exposures occur in the North American Great Plains, India continued to collide with Asia, creating dramatic new mountain ranges. The Tethys Seaway continued to shrink and then disappeared as Africa collided with Eurasia in the Turkish–Arabian region between 19 and 12 Ma. The subsequent uplift of mountains in the western Mediterranean region and a fall in sea levels combined to cause a temporary drying up of the Mediterranean Sea near the end of the Miocene. The global trend was towards increasing aridity caused primarily by global cooling reducing the ability of the atmosphere to absorb moisture, climates remained moderately warm, although the slow global cooling that eventually led to the Pleistocene glaciations continued. Although a long-term cooling trend was well underway, there is evidence of a period during the Miocene when the global climate rivalled that of the Oligocene. The Miocene warming began 21 million years ago and continued until 14 million years ago, by 8 million years ago, temperatures dropped sharply once again, and the Antarctic ice sheet was already approaching its present-day size and thickness. Greenland may have begun to have large glaciers as early as 7 to 8 million years ago, life during the Miocene Epoch was mostly supported by the two newly formed biomes, kelp forests and grasslands. This allows for more grazers, such as horses, rhinoceroses, ninety five percent of modern plants existed by the end of this epoch. The higher organic content and water retention of the deeper and richer grassland soils, with long term burial of carbon in sediments, produced a carbon and this, combined with higher surface albedo and lower evapotranspiration of grassland, contributed to a cooler, drier climate. The expansion of grasslands and radiations among terrestrial herbivores correlates to fluctuations in CO2
27.
Pliocene
–
The Pliocene Epoch is the epoch in the geologic timescale that extends from 5.333 million to 2.58 million years BP. It is the second and youngest epoch of the Neogene Period in the Cenozoic Era, the Pliocene follows the Miocene Epoch and is followed by the Pleistocene Epoch.588 to 1.806 million years ago, and is now included in the Pleistocene. As with other geologic periods, the geological strata that define the start and end are well identified but the exact dates of the start. The boundaries defining the Pliocene are not set at an easily identified worldwide event, the upper boundary was set at the start of the Pleistocene glaciations. The Pliocene was named by Sir Charles Lyell, the name comes from the Greek words πλεῖον and καινός and means roughly continuation of the recent, referring to the essentially modern marine mollusc faunas. H. W. Fowler called the term a regrettable barbarism, in the official timescale of the ICS, the Pliocene is subdivided into two stages. From youngest to oldest they are, Piacenzian Zanclean The Piacenzian is sometimes referred to as the Late Pliocene, in the system of North American Land Mammal Ages include Hemphillian, and Blancan. The Blancan extends forward into the Pleistocene, South American Land Mammal Ages include Montehermosan, Chapadmalalan and Uquian. In the Paratethys area the Pliocene contains the Dacian and Romanian stages, as usual in stratigraphy, there are many other regional and local subdivisions in use. In Britain the Pliocene is divided into the stages, Gedgravian, Waltonian, Pre-Ludhamian, Ludhamian, Thurnian, Bramertonian or Antian, Pre-Pastonian or Baventian, Pastonian and Beestonian. The exact correlations between these stages and the ICS stages is still a matter of detail. The formation of an Arctic ice cap is signaled by a shift in oxygen isotope ratios and ice-rafted cobbles in the North Atlantic. Mid-latitude glaciation was probably underway before the end of the epoch, the global cooling that occurred during the Pliocene may have spurred on the disappearance of forests and the spread of grasslands and savannas. Continents continued to drift, moving from positions possibly as far as 250 km from their present locations to positions only 70 km from their current locations, africas collision with Europe formed the Mediterranean Sea, cutting off the remnants of the Tethys Ocean. The border between the Miocene and the Pliocene is also the time of the Messinian salinity crisis, Sea level changes exposed the land-bridge between Alaska and Asia. Pliocene marine rocks are exposed in the Mediterranean, India. Elsewhere, they are exposed largely near shores, the change to a cooler, dry, seasonal climate had considerable impacts on Pliocene vegetation, reducing tropical species worldwide. Deciduous forests proliferated, coniferous forests and tundra covered much of the north, tropical forests were limited to a tight band around the equator, and in addition to dry savannahs, deserts appeared in Asia and Africa
28.
Laurasia
–
Laurasia was the more northern of two supercontinents that formed part of the Pangaea supercontinent around 335 to 175 million years ago. It separated from Gondwana 215 to 175 Mya during the breakup of Pangaea, the name combines the names of Laurentia, the name given to the North American craton, and Eurasia. To avoid confusion with the Mesozoic continent, this is referred to as Proto-Laurasia and it is believed that Laurasia did not break up again before it recombined with the southern continents to form the late Precambrian supercontinent of Pannotia, which remained until the early Cambrian. Laurasia was assembled, then broken up, due to the actions of plate tectonics, continental drift, and seafloor spreading. By the Devonian, North China was located near the Arctic Circle, no evidence, though, exists for any large-scale Carboniferous glaciation of the northern continents. Siberia moved southwards and joined with Kazakhstania, a continental region believed today to have been created during the Silurian by extensive volcanism. North China became, as it drifted southwards from near-Arctic latitudes, around 200 million years ago, Pangaea started to break up. Between eastern North America and northwest Africa, a new ocean formed - the Atlantic Ocean, though Greenland, the separation of Europe and Greenland occurred around 55 million years ago. Laurasia finally divided into the continents after which it is named, alexander du Toit Alfred Wegener Avalonia
29.
Abortifacient
–
An abortifacient is a substance that induces abortion. Abortifacients for animals that have mated undesirably are known as mismating shots, common abortifacients used in performing medical abortions include mifepristone, which is typically used in conjunction with misoprostol in a two-step approach. Oxytocin is commonly used to induce abortion in the second or third trimester, there are also several herbal mixtures with abortifacient claims, though there are no available data on the efficacy of these plants in humans. Prostaglandin analogues, such as misoprostol or gemeprost, are used to terminate pregnancy up to 24 or 60 days of gestation. Misoprostol administered vaginally is more effective than when administered orally, misoprostol is approved in France under the trade name GyMiso for use with mifepristone for medical abortion. Misoprostol is used off-label with mifepristone for medical abortion in the U. S. Dinoprostone, given by the extra-amniotic route, mifepristone is a progesterone receptor antagonist also known as RU-486. It is marketed under the trade name Mifegyne in France and countries other than the U. S. and it is used in conjunction with a prostaglandin analogue. Numerous non-pharmaceutical abortifacients existed during the pre-pharmaceutical era and these included herbal, mineral, and ritualistic or spiritual preparations. Their effectiveness is difficult to determine, as almost all such uses occurred before the days of clinical trials, today, many herbs and plants sold over the counter are claimed to act as abortifacients, either by themselves or if taken in certain doses or mixtures. Examples include brewers yeast, vitamin C, bitter melon, wild carrot, blue cohosh, pennyroyal, nutmeg, mugwort, papaya, vervain, common rue, ergot, saffron, animal studies have shown that pomegranate may be an effective abortifacient. In the Bible, the ordeal of the water is prescribed for a sotah. The wife drinks water of bitterness, which, if she is guilty, the ancient Greek colony of Cyrene at one time had an economy based almost entirely on the production and export of the plant silphium, considered a powerful abortifacient. Silphium figured so prominently in the wealth of Cyrene that the plant appeared on coins minted there, silphium, which was native only to that part of Libya, was overharvested by the Greeks and was effectively driven to extinction. The standard theory, however, has been challenged by a spectrum of alternatives. In aboriginal Australia, plants such as cymbidium madidum, petalostigma pubescens, medieval Muslim physicians documented detailed and extensive lists of birth control practices, including the use of abortifacients, commenting on their effectiveness and prevalence. In English law, abortion did not become illegal until 1803, English folk practice before and after that time held that fetal life was not present until quickening. Women who took drugs before that time would describe their actions as restoring the menses or bringing on a period, abortifacients used by women in England in the 19th century included diachylon, savin, ergot of rye, pennyroyal, nutmeg, rue, squills, and hiera picra. During the American slavery period, 18th and 19th centuries, cotton root bark was used in folk remedies to induce a miscarriage, methotrexate Georg Eberhard Rumphius – documented some claims of abortifacient properties of herbs The dictionary definition of abortifacient at Wiktionary
30.
Astringent
–
An astringent substance is a chemical compound that tends to shrink or constrict body tissues. The word astringent derives from Latin adstringere, meaning to bind fast, two common examples are calamine lotion and witch hazel. Another example is yerba mansa, a plant of California. Astringency is also the dry, puckering mouthfeel caused by tannins found in fruits such as blackthorn, Aronia chokeberry, chokecherry, bird cherry, quince and persimmon fruits. The tannins bind the salivary proteins, causing them to precipitate or aggregate, tannins are found in some red wines and teas. A small amount of astringency is expected in some wines, especially young red wines made from such as cabernet sauvignon. Astringents in medicine cause constriction or contraction of mucous membranes or exposed tissues and are used internally to check discharge of blood serum or mucous secretions. This can happen with a throat, hemorrhages, diarrhea. Externally applied astringents, which cause mild coagulation of proteins, dry, harden. People with acne are often advised to use if they have oily skin. Mild astringent solutions are used in the relief of minor skin irritations as those resulting from superficial cuts, allergies, insect bites. Some common astringent agents include alum, acacia, sage, yarrow, witch hazel, bayberry, distilled vinegar, very cold water, and rubbing alcohol. Astringent preparations include silver nitrate, potassium permanganate, zinc oxide, zinc sulfate, Burows solution, tincture of benzoin, balaustines are the red rose-like flowers of the pomegranate, which are very bitter to the taste. In medicine, their form has been used as an astringent. Some metal salts and acids have also used as astringents. Redness-reducing eye drops contain an astringent, in the past, Goulards Extract was used, but is now discontinued. The dictionary definition of astringent at Wiktionary
31.
Resin
–
In polymer chemistry and materials science, resin is a solid or highly viscous substance of plant or synthetic origin that is typically convertible into polymers. They are often mixtures of compounds, principally terpenes. Many plants, particularly woody plants, produce resin in response to injury, the resin acts as a bandage protecting the plant from invading insects and pathogens. Plants secrete resins and rosins for their protective benefits, the resin produced by most plants is composed mainly of terpenes and derivatives. Some resins also contain a proportion of resin acids. The individual components of resin can be separated by fractional distillation, rosins on the other hand are less volatile and consist, inter alia, of diterpenes. Amber is fossil resin from coniferous and other tree species, copal, kauri gum, dammar and other resins may also be found as subfossil deposits. Subfossil copal can be distinguished from genuine fossil amber because it becomes tacky when a drop of a solvent such as acetone or chloroform is placed on it, african copal and the kauri gum of New Zealand are also procured in a semi-fossil condition. Solidified resin from which the volatile terpene components have been removed by distillation is known as rosin, typical rosin is a transparent or translucent mass, with a vitreous fracture and a faintly yellow or brown colour, non-odorous or having only a slight turpentine odor and taste. Rosin is insoluble in water, mostly soluble in alcohol, essential oils, ether and hot fatty oils, and softens and melts under the influence of heat, rosin consists of a complex mixture of different substances including organic acids named the resin acids. These are closely related to the terpenes, and derive from them through partial oxidation, Resin acids can be dissolved in alkalis to form resin soaps, from which the purified resin acids are regenerated by treatment with acids. Examples of resin acids are abietic acid, C20H30O2, plicatic acid contained in cedar, and pimaric acid, C20H30O2, a constituent of galipot resin. Abietic acid can also be extracted from rosin by means of hot alcohol, it crystallizes in leaflets, pimaric acid closely resembles abietic acid into which it passes when distilled in a vacuum, it has been supposed to consist of three isomers. Rosin is obtained from pines and some plants, mostly conifers. Propolis, consisting largely of resins collected from such as poplars and conifers, is used by honey bees to seal gaps in their hives. Shellac and lacquer are examples of insect-derived resins, asphaltite and Utah resin are petroleum bitumens, not a product secreted by plants, although it was ultimately derived from plants. These were highly prized substances, and required as incense in religious rites. The word resin has been applied in the world to nearly any component of a liquid that will set into a hard lacquer or enamel-like finish
32.
Dye
–
A dye is a colored substance that has an affinity to the substrate to which it is being applied. The dye is applied in an aqueous solution, and may require a mordant to improve the fastness of the dye on the fiber. Both dyes and pigments are colored because they absorb some wavelengths of light more than others, in contrast to dyes, pigments are insoluble and have no affinity for the substrate. Some dyes can be precipitated with a salt to produce a lake pigment. The majority of natural dyes are from plant sources, roots, berries, bark, leaves, and wood, fungi, textile dyeing dates back to the Neolithic period. Throughout history, people have dyed their textiles using common, locally available materials, scarce dyestuffs that produced brilliant and permanent colors such as the natural invertebrate dyes Tyrian purple and crimson kermes were highly prized luxury items in the ancient and medieval world. Plant-based dyes such as woad, indigo, saffron, and madder were raised commercially and were important trade goods in the economies of Asia, across Asia and Africa, patterned fabrics were produced using resist dyeing techniques to control the absorption of color in piece-dyed cloth. Dyes from the New World such as cochineal and logwood were brought to Europe by the Spanish treasure fleets, dyed flax fibers have been found in the Republic of Georgia in a prehistoric cave dated to 36,000 BP. Archaeological evidence shows that, particularly in India and Phoenicia, dyeing has been carried out for over 5,000 years. The dyes were obtained from animal, vegetable or mineral origin, by far the greatest source of dyes has been from the plant kingdom, notably roots, berries, bark, leaves and wood, but only a few have ever been used on a commercial scale. The discovery of synthetic dyes late in the 19th century ended the large-scale market for natural dyes. These dyes are made from synthetic resources such as petroleum by-products, the first human-made organic aniline dye, mauveine, was discovered serendipitously by William Henry Perkin in 1856, the result of a failed attempt at the total synthesis of quinine. Other aniline dyes followed, such as fuchsine, safranine, many thousands of synthetic dyes have since been prepared. These may be natural or synthetic, other than pigmentation, they have a range of applications including organic dye lasers, optical media and camera sensors. This is the basic classification Dyes are classified according to their solubility, acid dyes are water-soluble anionic dyes that are applied to fibers such as silk, wool, nylon and modified acrylic fibers using neutral to acid dye baths. Attachment to the fiber is attributed, at least partly, to salt formation between anionic groups in the dyes and cationic groups in the fiber, acid dyes are not substantive to cellulosic fibers. Most synthetic food colors fall in this category, basic dyes are water-soluble cationic dyes that are mainly applied to acrylic fibers, but find some use for wool and silk. Usually acetic acid is added to the dye bath to help the uptake of the dye onto the fiber, basic dyes are also used in the coloration of paper
33.
Medicine
–
Medicine is the science and practice of the diagnosis, treatment, and prevention of disease. The word medicine is derived from Latin medicus, meaning a physician, Medicine encompasses a variety of health care practices evolved to maintain and restore health by the prevention and treatment of illness. Medicine has existed for thousands of years, during most of which it was an art frequently having connections to the religious and philosophical beliefs of local culture. For example, a man would apply herbs and say prayers for healing, or an ancient philosopher. In recent centuries, since the advent of modern science, most medicine has become a combination of art, while stitching technique for sutures is an art learned through practice, the knowledge of what happens at the cellular and molecular level in the tissues being stitched arises through science. Prescientific forms of medicine are now known as medicine and folk medicine. They remain commonly used with or instead of medicine and are thus called alternative medicine. For example, evidence on the effectiveness of acupuncture is variable and inconsistent for any condition, in contrast, treatments outside the bounds of safety and efficacy are termed quackery. Medical availability and clinical practice varies across the world due to differences in culture. In modern clinical practice, physicians personally assess patients in order to diagnose, treat, the doctor-patient relationship typically begins an interaction with an examination of the patients medical history and medical record, followed by a medical interview and a physical examination. Basic diagnostic medical devices are typically used, after examination for signs and interviewing for symptoms, the doctor may order medical tests, take a biopsy, or prescribe pharmaceutical drugs or other therapies. Differential diagnosis methods help to rule out conditions based on the information provided, during the encounter, properly informing the patient of all relevant facts is an important part of the relationship and the development of trust. The medical encounter is then documented in the record, which is a legal document in many jurisdictions. Follow-ups may be shorter but follow the general procedure. The diagnosis and treatment may take only a few minutes or a few weeks depending upon the complexity of the issue, the components of the medical interview and encounter are, Chief complaint, the reason for the current medical visit. They are in the patients own words and are recorded along with the duration of each one, also called chief concern or presenting complaint. History of present illness, the order of events of symptoms. Distinguishable from history of illness, often called past medical history
34.
Lipstick
–
Lipstick is a cosmetic product containing pigments, oils, waxes, and emollients that apply color, texture, and protection to the lips. Many colors and types of lipstick exist, as with most other types of makeup, lipstick is typically, but not exclusively, worn by women. Some lipsticks are also lip balms, to add color and hydration, ancient Americas oldest manual from the 13th century The Grolier Codex shows two Mayan woman wearing lipstick. Ancient Sumerian men and women were possibly the first to invent and wear lipstick and they crushed gemstones and used them to decorate their faces, mainly on the lips and around the eyes. Also Egyptians like Cleopatra crushed bugs to create a colour of red on their lips, also around 3000 BC to 1500 BC, women in the ancient Indus Valley Civilization applied red tinted lipstick to their lips for face decoration. Ancient Egyptians wore lipstick to show social status rather than gender and they extracted the red dye from fucus-algin,0. 01% iodine, and some bromine mannite, but this dye resulted in serious illness. Lipsticks with shimmering effects were made using a pearlescent substance found in fish scales. In Australia, Aboriginal girls would paint their mouths red with ocher for puberty rituals, lip colouring started to gain some popularity in 16th-century England. During the time of Queen Elizabeth I bright red lips and a white face became fashionable. At that time, lipstick was made from a blend of beeswax, only upper class women and male actors wore makeup. It was considered brazen and uncouth to wear makeup, in the 1850s, reports were being published warning women of the dangers of using lead and vermilion in cosmetics applied to the face. By the end of the 19th century, Guerlain, a French cosmetic company, the first commercial lipstick had been invented in 1884, by perfumers in Paris, France. It was covered in paper and made from deer tallow, castor oil. Prior to this, lipstick had been created at home, complete acceptance of the undisguised use of cosmetics in England appears to have arrived for the fashionable Londoner at least by 1921. In the 19th century, lipstick was colored with carmine dye, Carmine dye was extracted from cochineal, scale insects native to Mexico and Central America which live on cactus plants. Cochineal insects produce carminic acid to deter predation by other insects, carminic acid, which forms 17% to 24% of the weight of the dried insects, can be extracted from the insects body and eggs. Mixed with aluminum or calcium salts it makes carmine dye and this lipstick did not come in a tube, it was applied with a brush. Carmine dye was expensive and the look of carmine colored lipstick was considered unnatural and theatrical, only actors and actresses could get away with wearing lipstick
35.
Dragon
–
A dragon is a legendary creature, typically scaled or fire-spewing and with serpentine, reptilian or avian traits, that features in the myths of many cultures around world. The two most well-known cultural traditions of dragon are The European dragon, derived from European folk traditions and ultimately related to Balkans, most are depicted as reptilian creatures with animal-level intelligence, and are uniquely six-limbed. The Chinese dragon, with counterparts in Japan, Korea and other East Asian, most are depicted as serpentine creatures with above-average intelligence, and are quadrupeds. The two traditions may have evolved separately, but have influenced each other to a certain extent, the English word dragon and Latin word draco derives from Greek δράκων, dragon, serpent of huge size, water-snake. The Greek and Latin term referred to any great serpent, not necessarily mythological, a dragon is a mythological representation of a reptile. In antiquity, dragons were mostly envisaged as serpents, but since the Middle Ages, it has become common to them with legs. Dragons are usually shown in modern times with a body like a huge lizard, the European dragon has bat-like wings growing from its back. A dragon-like creature with wings but only a pair of legs is known as a wyvern. The association of the serpent with a monstrous opponent overcome by a deity has its roots in the mythology of the Ancient Near East, including Canaanite, Hittite. Humbaba, the fire-breathing dragon-fanged beast first described in the Epic of Gilgamesh, is described as a dragon with Gilgamesh playing the part of dragon-slayer. The folk-lore motif of the dragon guarding gold may have come from earlier Bronze Age customs of introducing serpents to village granaries to deter rats or mice. Although dragons occur in many legends around the world, different cultures have varying stories about monsters that have been grouped together under the dragon label, some dragons are said to breathe fire or to be poisonous, such as in the Old English poem Beowulf. They are commonly portrayed as serpentine or reptilian, hatching from eggs and they are sometimes portrayed as hoarding treasure. Some myths portray them with a row of dorsal spines, European dragons are more often winged, while Chinese dragons resemble large snakes. Dragons can have a number of legs, none, two, four, or more when it comes to early European literature. Dragons are often held to have spiritual significance in various religions. In many Asian cultures, dragons were, and in some still are, revered as representative of the primal forces of nature, religion. They are associated with wisdom—often said to be wiser than humans—and longevity and they are commonly said to possess some form of magic or other supernatural power, and are often associated with wells, rain, and rivers
36.
Alchemy
–
Alchemy is a philosophical and protoscientific tradition practiced throughout Europe, Egypt and Asia. It aimed to purify, mature, and perfect certain objects, the perfection of the human body and soul was thought to permit or result from the alchemical magnum opus and, in the Hellenistic and western tradition, the achievement of gnosis. In Europe, the creation of a stone was variously connected with all of these projects. In English, the term is limited to descriptions of European alchemy, but similar practices existed in the Far East, the Indian subcontinent. In Europe, following the 12th-century Renaissance produced by the translation of Islamic works on science, Islamic and European alchemists developed a structure of basic laboratory techniques, theory, terminology, and experimental method, some of which are still in use today. However, they continued antiquitys belief in four elements and guarded their work in secrecy including cyphers and their work was guided by Hermetic principles related to magic, mythology, and religion. The latter interests historians of esotericism, psychologists, and some philosophers, the subject has also made an ongoing impact on literature and the arts. The word alchemy was borrowed from Old French alquemie, alkimie, taken from Medieval Latin alchymia, the Arabic word is borrowed from Late Greek chēmeía, chēmía, with the agglutination of the Arabic definite article al-. This ancient Greek word was derived from the early Greek name for Egypt, Chēmia, based on the Egyptian name for Egypt, the Medieval Latin form was influenced by Greek chymeia meaning ‘mixture’ and referring to pharmaceutical chemistry. Alchemy covers several philosophical traditions spanning some four millennia and three continents and these traditions general penchant for cryptic and symbolic language makes it hard to trace their mutual influences and genetic relationships. It is still a question whether these three strands share a common origin, or to what extent they influenced each other. Here, elements of technology, religion, mythology, and Hellenistic philosophy, each with their own much longer histories, Zosimos of Panopolis wrote the oldest known books on alchemy, while Mary the Jewess is credited as being the first non-fictitious Western alchemist. They wrote in Greek and lived in Egypt under Roman rule, mythology – Zosimos of Panopolis asserted that alchemy dated back to Pharaonic Egypt where it was the domain of the priestly class, though there is little to no evidence for his assertion. Alchemical writers used Classical figures from Greek, Roman, and Egyptian mythology to illuminate their works and these included the pantheon of gods related to the Classical planets, Isis, Osiris, Jason, and many others. The central figure in the mythology of alchemy is Hermes Trismegistus and his name is derived from the god Thoth and his Greek counterpart Hermes. Hermes and his caduceus or serpent-staff, were among alchemys principal symbols, according to Clement of Alexandria, he wrote what were called the forty-two books of Hermes, covering all fields of knowledge. The Hermetica of Thrice-Great Hermes is generally understood to form the basis for Western alchemical philosophy and practice and these writings were collected in the first centuries of the common era. Technology – The dawn of Western alchemy is sometimes associated with that of metallurgy, Many writings were lost when the emperor Diocletian ordered the burning of alchemical books after suppressing a revolt in Alexandria
37.
Varnish
–
Varnish is a transparent, hard, protective finish or film that is primarily used in wood finishing but also for other materials. Varnish is traditionally a combination of a oil, a resin. Varnish finishes are usually glossy but may be designed to produce satin or semi-gloss sheens by the addition of flatting agents. Varnish has little or no color, is transparent, and has no added pigment, as opposed to paints or wood stains, varnishes are also applied over wood stains as a final step to achieve a film for gloss and protection. Some products are marketed as a stain and varnish. Resin varnishes dry by evaporation of the solvent and harden almost immediately upon drying, acrylic and waterborne varnishes dry upon evaporation of the water but will experience an extended curing period. Environmental factors such as heat and humidity play a large role in the drying and curing times of varnishes. In classic varnish the cure rate depends on the type of oil used and, to some extent, the drying and curing time of all varnishes may be sped up by exposure to an energy source such as sunlight, ultraviolet light, or heat. Many varnishes contain plant-derived oils, synthetic oils or resins as their binder in combination with organic solvents and these are highly flammable in their liquid state. A highly important note, that is often over looked, all drying oils, certain alkyds, thus, oil-soaked rags and paper can smolder and ignite into flames, even several hours after use if proper precautions are not taken. Varnishing was a well known in ancient Egypt. Varnishing is also recorded in the history of Asia, in India, China and Japan, where the practice of lacquer work, varnishing was likely popular in India & China before it spread to Japan and Korea. Varnish and lacquer work are, however, generally treated in the arts as separate, berenice comes from the Greek words phero + nike. There are many different types of drying oils, including linseed oil, tung oil and these contain high levels of polyunsaturated fatty acids. Resins that are used in varnishes include amber, kauri gum, dammar, copal, rosin, sandarac, balsam, elemi, mastic, in the 1900s in Canada, resins from local trees were used to finish pianos. As a result, these now antique pianos are considered difficult to refinish, however, shellac can be used over the existing resins provided sufficient time is allowed for thin coats to cure. Thus the original finish can be returned to its original lustre while preserving the color, violin varnishing is a multi-step process involving some or all of the following, primer, sealer, ground, color coats, and clear topcoat. Some systems use an oil varnish as described below, while others use spirit varnish
38.
Violin
–
The violin is a wooden string instrument in the violin family. It is the smallest and highest-pitched instrument in the family in regular use, smaller violin-type instruments are known, including the violino piccolo and the kit violin, but these are virtually unused in the 2010s. The violin typically has four strings tuned in fifths, and is most commonly played by drawing a bow across its strings. Violins are important instruments in a variety of musical genres. They are most prominent in the Western classical tradition and in varieties of folk music. They are also used in genres of folk including country music and bluegrass music. Electric violins are used in forms of rock music, further. The violin is sometimes called a fiddle, particularly in Irish traditional music and bluegrass. The violin was first known in 16th-century Italy, with further modifications occurring in the 18th and 19th centuries. In Europe it served as the basis for stringed instruments used in classical music, the viola. According to their reputation, the quality of their sound has defied attempts to explain or equal it, many of these trade instruments were formerly sold by Sears, Roebuck and Co. and other mass merchandisers. A person who makes or repairs violins is called a luthier or violinmaker, the parts of a violin are usually made from different types of wood and on the use of a pickup and an amplifier and speaker). Violins can be strung with gut, Perlon or other synthetic, the earliest stringed instruments were mostly plucked. Similar and variant types were probably disseminated along East-West trading routes from Asia into the Middle East, the first makers of violins probably borrowed from various developments of the Byzantine lira. These included the rebec, the Arabic rebab, the vielle, the earliest pictures of violins, albeit with three strings, are seen in northern Italy around 1530, at around the same time as the words violino and vyollon are seen in Italian and French documents. One of the earliest explicit descriptions of the instrument, including its tuning, is from the Epitome musical by Jambe de Fer, by this time, the violin had already begun to spread throughout Europe. The violin proved very popular, both among street musicians and the nobility, the French king Charles IX ordered Andrea Amati to construct 24 violins for him in 1560, one of these noble instruments, the Charles IX, is the oldest surviving violin. The Messiah or Le Messie made by Antonio Stradivari in 1716 remains pristine and it is now located in the Ashmolean Museum of Oxford
39.
Quenching
–
In materials science, quenching is the rapid cooling of a workpiece to obtain certain material properties. A type of heat treating, quenching prevents undesired low-temperature processes, such as phase transformations, in steel alloyed with metals such as nickel and manganese, the eutectoid temperature becomes much lower, but the kinetic barriers to phase transformation remain the same. This allows quenching to start at a temperature, making the process much easier. High speed steel also has added tungsten, which serves to raise kinetic barriers, even cooling such alloys slowly in air has most of the desired effects of quenching. Extremely rapid cooling can prevent the formation of all crystal structure, if the percentage of carbon is less than 0.4 percent, quenching is not possible. Quench hardening is a process in which steel and cast iron alloys are strengthened and hardened. These metals consist of metals and alloys. This is done by heating the material to a certain temperature and this produces a harder material by either surface hardening or through-hardening varying on the rate at which the material is cooled. The material is often tempered to reduce the brittleness that may increase from the quench hardening process. Items that may be quenched include gears, shafts, and wear blocks, pearlite is not an ideal material for many common applications of steel alloys, as it is quite soft. Steels with this Martensitic structure are used in applications when the workpiece must be highly resistant to deformation. The process of quenching is a progression, beginning with heating the sample, most materials are heated to between 815 and 900 °C, with careful attention paid to keeping temperatures throughout the workpiece uniform. Minimizing uneven heating and overheating is key to imparting desired material properties, the second step in the quenching process is soaking. Workpieces can be soaked in air, a bath, or a vacuum. The recommended time allocation in salt or lead baths is up to 6 minutes, soaking times can range a little higher within a vacuum. As in the step, it is important that the temperature throughout the sample remains as uniform as possible during soaking. Once the workpiece has finished soaking, it moves on to the cooling step, during this step, the part is submerged into some kind of quenching fluid, different quenching fluids can have a significant effect on the final characteristics of a quenched part. Water is one of the most efficient quenching media where maximum hardness is desired, when hardness can be sacrificed, mineral oils are often used
40.
Tempering (metallurgy)
–
Tempering is a process of heat treating, which is used to increase the toughness of iron-based alloys. The exact temperature determines the amount of hardness removed, and depends on both the composition of the alloy and on the desired properties in the finished product. For instance, very hard tools are often tempered at low temperatures, tempering is a heat treatment technique applied to ferrous alloys, such as steel or cast iron, to achieve greater toughness by decreasing the hardness of the alloy. The reduction in hardness is usually accompanied by an increase in ductility, tempering is usually performed after quenching, which is rapid cooling of the metal to put it in its hardest state. Tempering is accomplished by controlled heating of the quenched work-piece to a temperature below its critical temperature. Heating above this temperature is avoided, so as not to destroy the very-hard, quenched microstructure, precise control of time and temperature during the tempering process is crucial to achieve the desired balance of physical properties. Low tempering temperatures may only relieve the stresses, decreasing brittleness while maintaining a majority of the hardness. Higher tempering temperatures tend to produce a reduction in the hardness, sacrificing some yield strength. In carbon steels, tempering alters the size and distribution of carbides in the martensite, tempering is also performed on normalized steels and cast irons, to increase ductility, machinability, and impact strength. Tempering is an ancient heat-treating technique, the oldest known example of tempered martensite is a pick axe which was found in Galilee, dating from around 1200 to 1100 BC. The process was used throughout the ancient world, from Asia to Europe, tempering was often confused with quenching and, often, the term was used to describe both techniques. I shall employ the word tempering in the sense as softening. In metallurgy, one may encounter many terms that have specific meanings within the field. Terms such as hardness, impact resistance, toughness, and strength can carry many different connotations, some of the terms encountered, and their specific definitions are, Strength, also called rigidity, this is resistance to permanent deformation and tearing. Strength, in metallurgy, is still a vague term, so is usually divided into yield strength, tensile strength, shear strength. Toughness, Resistance to fracture, as measured by the Charpy test, toughness often increases as strength decreases, because a material that bends is less likely to break. Hardness, Hardness is often used to strength or rigidity but, in metallurgy. In conventional metal alloys, there is a relation between indentation hardness and tensile strength, which eases the measurement of the latter
41.
International Union for Conservation of Nature
–
The International Union for Conservation of Nature is an international organization working in the field of nature conservation and sustainable use of natural resources. It is involved in gathering and analysis, research, field projects, advocacy, lobbying. IUCNs mission is to influence, encourage and assist societies throughout the world to conserve nature and to ensure that any use of resources is equitable. Over the past decades, IUCN has widened its focus beyond conservation ecology and now incorporates issues related to equality, poverty alleviation. Unlike other international NGOs, IUCN does not itself aim to mobilize the public in support of nature conservation and it tries to influence the actions of governments, business and other stakeholders by providing information and advice, and through lobbying and partnerships. The organization is best known to the public for compiling and publishing the IUCN Red List. IUCN has a membership of over 1200 governmental and non-governmental organizations, some 11,000 scientists and experts participate in the work of IUCN commissions on a voluntary basis. It employs approximately 1000 full-time staff in more than 60 countries and its headquarters are in Gland, Switzerland. IUCN has observer and consultative status at the United Nations, and plays a role in the implementation of several conventions on nature conservation. It was involved in establishing the World Wide Fund for Nature, in the past, IUCN has been criticized for placing the interests of nature over those of indigenous peoples. In recent years, its relations with the business sector have caused controversy. It was previously called the International Union for Protection of Nature, establishment In 1947, the Swiss League for the Protection of Nature organised an international conference on the protection of nature in Brunnen. It is considered to be the first government-organized non-governmental organization, the initiative to set up the new organisation came from UNESCO and especially from its first Director General, the British biologist Julian Huxley. At the time of its founding IUPN was the international organisation focusing on the entire spectrum of nature conservation Early years. Its secretariat was located in Brussels and its first work program focused on saving species and habitats, increasing and applying knowledge, advancing education, promoting international agreements and promoting conservation. Providing a solid base for conservation action was the heart of all activities. IUPN and UNESCO were closely associated and they jointly organized the 1949 Conference on Protection of Nature. In preparation for this conference a list of endangered species was drawn up for the first time
42.
PubMed Identifier
–
PubMed is a free search engine accessing primarily the MEDLINE database of references and abstracts on life sciences and biomedical topics. The United States National Library of Medicine at the National Institutes of Health maintains the database as part of the Entrez system of information retrieval, from 1971 to 1997, MEDLINE online access to the MEDLARS Online computerized database primarily had been through institutional facilities, such as university libraries. PubMed, first released in January 1996, ushered in the era of private, free, home-, the PubMed system was offered free to the public in June 1997, when MEDLINE searches via the Web were demonstrated, in a ceremony, by Vice President Al Gore. Information about the journals indexed in MEDLINE, and available through PubMed, is found in the NLM Catalog. As of 5 January 2017, PubMed has more than 26.8 million records going back to 1966, selectively to the year 1865, and very selectively to 1809, about 500,000 new records are added each year. As of the date,13.1 million of PubMeds records are listed with their abstracts. In 2016, NLM changed the system so that publishers will be able to directly correct typos. Simple searches on PubMed can be carried out by entering key aspects of a subject into PubMeds search window, when a journal article is indexed, numerous article parameters are extracted and stored as structured information. Such parameters are, Article Type, Secondary identifiers, Language, publication type parameter enables many special features. As these clinical girish can generate small sets of robust studies with considerable precision, since July 2005, the MEDLINE article indexing process extracts important identifiers from the article abstract and puts those in a field called Secondary Identifier. The secondary identifier field is to store numbers to various databases of molecular sequence data, gene expression or chemical compounds. For clinical trials, PubMed extracts trial IDs for the two largest trial registries, ClinicalTrials. gov and the International Standard Randomized Controlled Trial Number Register, a reference which is judged particularly relevant can be marked and related articles can be identified. If relevant, several studies can be selected and related articles to all of them can be generated using the Find related data option, the related articles are then listed in order of relatedness. To create these lists of related articles, PubMed compares words from the title and abstract of each citation, as well as the MeSH headings assigned, using a powerful word-weighted algorithm. The related articles function has been judged to be so precise that some researchers suggest it can be used instead of a full search, a strong feature of PubMed is its ability to automatically link to MeSH terms and subheadings. Examples would be, bad breath links to halitosis, heart attack to myocardial infarction, where appropriate, these MeSH terms are automatically expanded, that is, include more specific terms. Terms like nursing are automatically linked to Nursing or Nursing and this important feature makes PubMed searches automatically more sensitive and avoids false-negative hits by compensating for the diversity of medical terminology. The My NCBI area can be accessed from any computer with web-access, an earlier version of My NCBI was called PubMed Cubby
43.
Wikidata
–
Wikidata is a collaboratively edited knowledge base operated by the Wikimedia Foundation. It is intended to provide a source of data which can be used by Wikimedia projects such as Wikipedia. This is similar to the way Wikimedia Commons provides storage for files and access to those files for all Wikimedia projects. Wikidata is powered by the software Wikibase, Wikidata is a document-oriented database, focused on items. Each item represents a topic and is identified by a number, prefixed with the letter Q—for example. This enables the basic information required to identify the topic the item covers to be translated without favouring any language, information is added to items by creating statements. Statements take the form of pairs, with each statement consisting of a property. The creation of the project was funded by donations from the Allen Institute for Artificial Intelligence, the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation, at this time, only the first phase was available. Historically, a Wikipedia article would include a list of links, being links to articles on the same topic in other editions of Wikipedia. Initially, Wikidata was a repository of interlanguage links. No Wikipedia language editions were able to access Wikidata, so they needed to continue to maintain their own lists of interlanguage links, on 14 January 2013, the Hungarian Wikipedia became the first to enable the provision of interlanguage links via Wikidata. This functionality was extended to the Hebrew and Italian Wikipedias on 30 January, to the English Wikipedia on 13 February, on 23 September 2013, phase 1 went live on Wikimedia Commons. The first aspects of the second phase were deployed on 4 February 2013, the values were initially limited to two data types, with more data types to follow later. The first new type, string, was deployed on 6 March, the ability of the various language editions of Wikipedia to access data added to Wikidata as part of phase two was rolled out progressively between 27 March and 25 April 2013. On 16 September 2015, Wikidata began allowing so-called arbitrary access, for example, in the past the article about Berlin you could not access data about Germany, but with arbitrary access it could. On 27 April 2016 arbitrary access was activated on Wikimedia Commons, phase 3 will involve database querying and the creation of lists based on data stored on Wikidata. As of October 2016 two tools for querying Wikidata were available, AutoList and PetScan, additionally to a public SPARQL endpoint, there is concern that the project is being influenced by lobbying companies, PR professionals and search engine optimizers. As of December 2015, according to Wikimedia statistics, half of the information in Wikidata is unsourced, another 30% is labeled as having come from Wikipedia, but with no indication as to which article
