Chủ Nhật, 30 tháng 7, 2017

Wikipedia article of the day for July 31, 2017

The Wikipedia article of the day for July 31, 2017 is Gubby Allen.
Gubby Allen (1902–1989) was a cricketer who captained England in eleven Test matches. Born in Sydney, Australia, on 31 July 1902, his family moved to London when he was six. In first-class matches, he played for Middlesex and Cambridge University. A fast bowler and hard-hitting lower-order batsman for England, Allen was appointed captain in 1936 and led the team during the unsuccessful 1936–37 tour of Australia. He captained England in a Test series in the West Indies in 1947–48. He later became an influential cricket administrator who held key positions in the Marylebone Cricket Club (MCC), which effectively ruled English cricket at the time. He was instrumental in the creation of an MCC coaching manual, and worked hard to eliminate illegal bowling actions. As chairman of selectors from 1955 to 1961, he presided over a period of great success for English cricket, during which he worked closely with the Test captain Peter May. In 1963, he became MCC's president, and was made the club's treasurer the following year. In this role, he was deeply involved in the D'Oliveira affair, a controversy over the potential selection of Basil D'Oliveira to tour South Africa. He was knighted in 1986.

Thứ Bảy, 29 tháng 7, 2017

Wikipedia article of the day for July 30, 2017

The Wikipedia article of the day for July 30, 2017 is Giganotosaurus.
Giganotosaurus ("giant southern lizard") is a genus of theropod dinosaur that lived in what is now Argentina, around 99.6 to 97 million years ago. It was one of the largest known terrestrial carnivores, but the exact size has been hard to determine from the incomplete remains found so far. The holotype specimen, discovered in Patagonia in 1993, is almost 70% complete, and indicates a length of 12 to 13 m (39 to 43 ft), a skull 1.53 to 1.80 m (5.0 to 5.9 ft) in length, and a weight of 4.2 to 13.8 t (4.6 to 15.2 short tons). A length of 13.2 m (43 ft) has been extrapolated from another individual's dentary bone. Some researchers believe the animal to be larger than Tyrannosaurus, generally considered the largest theropod. The skull was low, with a ridge-like crest in front of the eye. The teeth were serrated, and the front of the lower jaw was flattened. Giganotosaurus is thought to have had a homeothermic metabolism, between that of a mammal and a reptile, which would have enabled rapid growth but not fast movement. It was probably the apex predator of its ecosystem, feeding on juvenile sauropod dinosaurs.

Thứ Sáu, 28 tháng 7, 2017

Wikipedia article of the day for July 29, 2017

The Wikipedia article of the day for July 29, 2017 is Isidor Isaac Rabi.
Isidor Isaac Rabi (1898–1988) was an American physicist and Nobel laureate. Born on 29 July 1898 into a traditional Jewish family in what was then part of Austria-Hungary, Rabi came to the United States as a baby and was raised in New York's Lower East Side. In collaboration with Gregory Breit, he developed the Breit-Rabi equation, and predicted that the Stern–Gerlach experiment could be modified to confirm the properties of the atomic nucleus. During World War II he worked on radar at the MIT Radiation Laboratory, and on the Manhattan Project. He was awarded the Nobel Prize for Physics in 1944 for his discovery of nuclear magnetic resonance, used in spectroscopy and imaging. He was also one of the first scientists in the US to work on the cavity magnetron, a key component in microwave radar and microwave ovens. After the war, he served on the General Advisory Committee of the Atomic Energy Commission, and was its chairman from 1952 to 1956. He was Science Advisor to President Dwight D. Eisenhower, and was involved in the creation of the Brookhaven National Laboratory (1947) and CERN (1954).

Thứ Năm, 27 tháng 7, 2017

Wikipedia article of the day for July 28, 2017

The Wikipedia article of the day for July 28, 2017 is Yugoslav monitor Sava.
The ship that became the Yugoslav monitor Sava began as SMS Bodrog, a river monitor built for the Austro-Hungarian Navy. She and two other monitors fired the first shots of World War I on the night of 28 July 1914, when they shelled Serbian defences near Belgrade. She fought the Serbian and Romanian armies during the war, and was captured in its closing stages. She was transferred to the newly created Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes (later Yugoslavia), and renamed Sava. During the Axis invasion of Yugoslavia in April 1941, she fought off several air attacks, but was scuttled on 11 April. Sava was later raised by the Independent State of Croatia, an Axis puppet state, and continued to serve under that name until 1944 when she was again scuttled. Following World War II, Sava was raised again, and was refurbished to serve in the Yugoslav Navy from 1952 to 1962. After that she became a commercial gravel barge. In 2005, the government of Serbia granted her limited heritage protection after citizens demanded that she be preserved as a floating museum.

Thứ Tư, 26 tháng 7, 2017

Wikipedia article of the day for July 27, 2017

The Wikipedia article of the day for July 27, 2017 is Roosevelt dime.
The Roosevelt dime is the current ten-cent piece of the United States, displaying President Franklin D. Roosevelt on the obverse. Authorized soon after his death in 1945, it has been produced by the Mint continuously since 1946 in large numbers. Roosevelt had been stricken with polio, and was one of the moving forces of the March of Dimes. The ten-cent coin could legally be changed by the Mint without the need for congressional action, and officials moved quickly to replace the Mercury dime. Chief Engraver John R. Sinnock prepared models, but faced repeated criticism from the Commission of Fine Arts. He modified his design in response, and the coin went into circulation in January 1946. The Mint transitioned from striking the coin in silver to base metal in 1965, and the design remains essentially unaltered from when Sinnock created it. Without rare dates or silver content, the dime is less widely sought by coin collectors than other modern American coins.

Thứ Ba, 25 tháng 7, 2017

Wikipedia article of the day for July 26, 2017

The Wikipedia article of the day for July 26, 2017 is Calvatia sculpta.
Calvatia sculpta, commonly known as the sculpted puffball, is a species of puffball fungus in the family Agaricaceae. Up to 8 to 15 cm (3.1 to 5.9 in) tall by 8 to 10 cm (3.1 to 3.9 in) wide, the pear- or egg-shaped puffball is readily recognizable from the large pyramidal or polygonal warts covering its surface. It is edible when young, before the spores inside the fruit body disintegrate into a brownish powder. Originally described from the Sierra Nevada, C. sculpta is found in mountainous areas in western North America, and was found in a Brazilian dune in 2008. It may be easily confused with Calbovista subsculpta, a similar puffball that—in addition to differences observable only with microscopy—is larger, and has slightly raised warts with a felt-like texture. Other similar species include Calvatia arctica and immature specimens of Amanita magniverrucata. The species was first described in 1885 by American mycologist Harvey Willson Harkness, who called it "a curious and strikingly beautiful species".

Thứ Hai, 24 tháng 7, 2017

Wikipedia article of the day for July 25, 2017

The Wikipedia article of the day for July 25, 2017 is Kill 'Em All.
Kill 'Em All is the debut studio album by the American heavy metal band Metallica, released on July 25, 1983, by the independent record label Megaforce Records. It is a groundbreaking album for thrash metal, which fuses riffs of the new wave of British heavy metal with hardcore punk tempos. Its musical approach and lyrics, markedly different from rock's mainstream of the early Eighties, inspired other thrash metal bands. The album did not enter the Billboard 200 until 1986, when it peaked at number 155, following Metallica's commercial success with its third studio album Master of Puppets; the 1988 Elektra reissue peaked at number 120. Kill 'Em All was critically praised at the time of its release and was ranked at number 35 on Rolling Stone's 100 Greatest Metal Albums of All Time list. It was certified 3× Platinum by the Recording Industry Association of America in 1999 for shipping three million copies in the United States. The album generated two singles: "Whiplash" and "Jump in the Fire". Metallica promoted the album on the Kill 'Em All for One tour with Raven in the United States.