|
Afzelia Bracteata
''Afzelia'' is a genus of plants in family Fabaceae. The thirteen species all are trees, native to tropical Africa or Asia. The genus name of ''Afzelia'' is in honour of Adam Afzelius (1750–1837), a Swedish botanist and an apostle of Carl Linnaeus. Uses ''Afzelia'' species are used primarily for wood, though some species also have medicinal uses. The timber is most commonly traded under the collective name "doussie", as well as under name "afzelia". One of the common names is also "pod mahogany", adding to the confusion surrounding the name mahogany. The seeds are red and black and are used as beads. The wood is often used as the surface material for outdoor velodromes. The highly figured wood of the Asian species, ''Afzelia xylocarpa'', is sold as Afzelia xylay. The seeds and bark of this species are used as medicine. The dense and wavy wood of an ''Afzelia africana'' is used in ship-building Shipbuilding is the construction of ships and other floating vessels. ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Africa
Africa is the world's second-largest and second-most populous continent, after Asia in both cases. At about 30.3 million km2 (11.7 million square miles) including adjacent islands, it covers 6% of Earth's total surface area and 20% of its land area.Sayre, April Pulley (1999), ''Africa'', Twenty-First Century Books. . With billion people as of , it accounts for about of the world's human population. Africa's population is the youngest amongst all the continents; the median age in 2012 was 19.7, when the worldwide median age was 30.4. Despite a wide range of natural resources, Africa is the least wealthy continent per capita and second-least wealthy by total wealth, behind Oceania. Scholars have attributed this to different factors including geography, climate, tribalism, colonialism, the Cold War, neocolonialism, lack of democracy, and corruption. Despite this low concentration of wealth, recent economic expansion and the large and young population make Afr ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Afzelia
''Afzelia'' is a genus of plants in family Fabaceae. The thirteen species all are trees, native to tropical Africa or Asia. The genus name of ''Afzelia'' is in honour of Adam Afzelius (1750–1837), a Swedish botanist and an apostle of Carl Linnaeus. Uses ''Afzelia'' species are used primarily for wood, though some species also have medicinal uses. The timber is most commonly traded under the collective name "doussie", as well as under name "afzelia". One of the common names is also "pod mahogany", adding to the confusion surrounding the name mahogany. The seeds are red and black and are used as beads. The wood is often used as the surface material for outdoor velodromes. The highly figured wood of the Asian species, ''Afzelia xylocarpa'', is sold as Afzelia xylay. The seeds and bark of this species are used as medicine. The dense and wavy wood of an ''Afzelia africana'' is used in ship-building Shipbuilding is the construction of ships and other floating vessels. It ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ship-building
Shipbuilding is the construction of ships and other floating vessels. It normally takes place in a specialized facility known as a shipyard. Shipbuilders, also called shipwrights, follow a specialized occupation that traces its roots to before recorded history. Shipbuilding and ship repairs, both commercial and military, are referred to as "naval engineering". The construction of boats is a similar activity called boat building. The dismantling of ships is called ship breaking. History Pre-history The earliest known depictions (including paintings and models) of shallow-water sailing boats is from the 6th to 5th millennium BC of the Ubaid period of Mesopotamia. They were made from bundled reeds coated in bitumen and had bipod masts. They sailed in shallow coastal waters of the Persian Gulf. 4th millennium BC Ancient Egypt Evidence from Ancient Egypt shows that the early Egyptians knew how to assemble planks of wood into a ship hull as early as 3100 BC. Egyptian potte ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Medicine
Medicine is the science and practice of caring for a patient, managing the diagnosis, prognosis, prevention, treatment, palliation of their injury or disease, and promoting their health. Medicine encompasses a variety of health care practices evolved to maintain and restore health by the prevention and treatment of illness. Contemporary medicine applies biomedical sciences, biomedical research, genetics, and medical technology to diagnose, treat, and prevent injury and disease, typically through pharmaceuticals or surgery, but also through therapies as diverse as psychotherapy, external splints and traction, medical devices, biologics, and ionizing radiation, amongst others. Medicine has been practiced since prehistoric times, and for most of this time it was an art (an area of skill and knowledge), frequently having connections to the religious and philosophical beliefs of local culture. For example, a medicine man would apply herbs and say prayers for healing, o ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Velodrome
A velodrome is an arena for track cycling. Modern velodromes feature steeply banked oval tracks, consisting of two 180-degree circular bends connected by two straights. The straights transition to the circular turn through a moderate Track transition curve, easement curve. History The first velodromes were constructed during the late 1870s, the oldest of which is Preston Park Velodrome, Brighton, United Kingdom, built in 1877 by the British Army. Some were purpose-built just for cycling, and others were built as part of facilities for other sports; many were built around athletics tracks or other grounds and any banking was shallow. Reflecting the then-lack of international standards, sizes varied and not all were built as ovals: for example, Preston Park is long and features four straights linked by banked curves, while the Portsmouth velodrome, in Portsmouth, has a single straight linked by one long curve. Early surfaces included cinders or shale, though concrete, asphalt ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Bead
A bead is a small, decorative object that is formed in a variety of shapes and sizes of a material such as stone, bone, shell, glass, plastic, wood, or pearl and with a small hole for threading or stringing. Beads range in size from under to over in diameter. Beads represent some of the earliest forms of jewellery, with a pair of beads made from ''Nassarius'' sea snail shells dating to approximately 100,000 years ago thought to be the earliest known example. Beadwork is the art or craft of making things with beads. Beads can be woven together with specialized thread, strung onto thread or soft, flexible wire, or adhered to a surface (e.g. fabric, clay). Types of beads Beads can be divided into several types of overlapping categories based on different criteria such as the materials from which they are made, the process used in their manufacturing, the place or period of origin, the patterns on their surface, or their general shape. In some cases, such as millefiori and ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Seed
A seed is an embryonic plant enclosed in a protective outer covering, along with a food reserve. The formation of the seed is a part of the process of reproduction in seed plants, the spermatophytes, including the gymnosperm and angiosperm plants. Seeds are the product of the ripened ovule, after the embryo sac is fertilized by sperm from pollen, forming a zygote. The embryo within a seed develops from the zygote, and grows within the mother plant to a certain size before growth is halted. The seed coat arises from the integuments of the ovule. Seeds have been an important development in the reproduction and success of vegetable gymnosperm and angiosperm plants, relative to more primitive plants such as ferns, mosses and liverworts, which do not have seeds and use water-dependent means to propagate themselves. Seed plants now dominate biological niches on land, from forests to grasslands both in hot and cold climates. The term "seed" also has a general me ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Mahogany
Mahogany is a straight-grained, reddish-brown timber of three tropical hardwood species of the genus ''Swietenia'', indigenous to the AmericasBridgewater, Samuel (2012). ''A Natural History of Belize: Inside the Maya Forest''. Austin: University of Texas Press. pp. 164–165. . and part of the pantropical chinaberry family, Meliaceae. Mahogany is used commercially for a wide variety of goods, due to its coloring and durable nature. It is naturally found within the Americas, but has also been imported to plantations across Asia and Oceania. The mahogany trade may have begun as early as the 16th century and flourished in the 17th and 18th centuries. In certain countries, mahogany is considered an invasive species. Description The three species are: *Honduran or big-leaf mahogany ('' Swietenia macrophylla''), with a range from Mexico to southern Amazonia in Brazil, the most widespread species of mahogany and the only genuine mahogany species commercially grown today. Illegal l ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Wood
Wood is a porous and fibrous structural tissue found in the stems and roots of trees and other woody plants. It is an organic materiala natural composite of cellulose fibers that are strong in tension and embedded in a matrix of lignin that resists compression. Wood is sometimes defined as only the secondary xylem in the stems of trees, or it is defined more broadly to include the same type of tissue elsewhere such as in the roots of trees or shrubs. In a living tree it performs a support function, enabling woody plants to grow large or to stand up by themselves. It also conveys water and nutrients between the leaves, other growing tissues, and the roots. Wood may also refer to other plant materials with comparable properties, and to material engineered from wood, or woodchips or fiber. Wood has been used for thousands of years for fuel, as a construction material, for making tools and weapons, furniture and paper. More recently it emerged as a feedstock for the productio ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Carl Linnaeus
Carl Linnaeus (; 23 May 1707 – 10 January 1778), also known after his ennoblement in 1761 as Carl von Linné Blunt (2004), p. 171. (), was a Swedish botanist, zoologist, taxonomist, and physician who formalised binomial nomenclature, the modern system of naming organisms. He is known as the "father of modern taxonomy". Many of his writings were in Latin; his name is rendered in Latin as and, after his 1761 ennoblement, as . Linnaeus was born in Råshult, the countryside of Småland, in southern Sweden. He received most of his higher education at Uppsala University and began giving lectures in botany there in 1730. He lived abroad between 1735 and 1738, where he studied and also published the first edition of his ' in the Netherlands. He then returned to Sweden where he became professor of medicine and botany at Uppsala. In the 1740s, he was sent on several journeys through Sweden to find and classify plants and animals. In the 1750s and 1760s, he continued to collect an ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Adam Afzelius
Adam Afzelius (8 October 175020 January 1837) was a Swedish botanist and an apostle of Carl Linnaeus. Afzelius was born at Larv in Västergötland in 1750. He was appointed teacher of oriental languages at Uppsala University in 1777, and in 1785 demonstrator of botany. In 1793 he was elected a member of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences. In 1800, Adam Afzelius became member of the German Academy of Sciences Leopoldina. Between 1792 and 1796, as part of the Sierra Leone Company, he made two journeys to West Africa, where he reported on the geography, climate and natural resources of the region. While here, he also collected botanical specimens that were later acquired by Uppsala University.Afzelius, Adam (1750-1837) at JSTOR Global Plants In 1797-98 he acted as secretary of the Swedish |
.svg "Click for more on -> Africa")
.png "Click for more on -> Ship-building")
.jpg "Click for more on -> Mahogany")
