Welcome to Citizendium

Natural Sciences           Social Sciences           Humanities     Arts           Applied Arts and Sciences           Recreation

A new wiki encyclopedia project—and more! We aim at reliability and quality, not just quantity. We welcome collaboration with everyone who has knowledge, broad or narrow, about any of the world's innumerable subjects. We write under our real names—and are both collegial and congenial. We now have [[:Category:CZ Live|Template:Articles number+ articles]] and are gathering speed. Eduzendium participants write for academic credit. Write for the Citizendium—knowledge is fun! Sign up—we need both authors and editors (you might be both!) Then, get a quick start. Remember, we are an open, young project—it's easy to get involved! Learn about us Why Citizendium? For readers: About | FAQ For contributors: Authors | Editors | How to collaborate For the press Important new community pages WatchKnow will be a free, non-profit, K-12 educational video contest, currently under planning and development. Myths and Facts: Citizendium may be different from what you think! We are organizing Workgroup Weeks--our biggest initiative yet. Citizens, get involved, and watch our numbers multiply! Support us Our mission is educational, non-profit, global, and free. Shop at our Amazon.com and Barnes & Noble links and we'll get donations at no cost to you. Link to us so search engines can better find us.   (CC) Photo: Tanya Puntti Each sentence you add is another drop in an expanding sea of words.

Some of our finest [ about ] Approved Articles Developed Articles (over 800) "Share your knowledge. It's a way to achieve immortality." — Life's Little Instruction Book by Jackson Brown and H. Jackson Brown, Jr. Article of the Week [ about ] Three-dimensional model of the structure of part of a DNA double helix. Deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) is a very large biological molecule that is vital in providing information for the development and reproduction of living things. Every living organism has its own DNA sequence that is like a unique 'barcode' or 'fingerprint'. This inheritable variation in DNA is the most important factor driving evolutionary change over many generations. But, beyond these general characteristics, what "exactly" is DNA? What are the precise physical attributes of this molecule that make its role so centrally imposing in understanding life? DNA is a long polymer of simple units called nucleotides, held together by a sugar phosphate backbone. Attached to each sugar molecule is a molecule of one of four bases; adenine (A), thymine (T), guanine (G) or cytosine (C), and the order of these bases on the DNA strand encodes information. In most organisms, DNA is a double-helix (or duplex molecule) consisting of two DNA strands coiled around each other, and held together by hydrogen bonds between bases. Because of the chemical nature of these bases, adenine always pairs with thymine and guanine always pairs with cytosine. This complementarity forms the basis of semi-conservative DNA replication — it makes it possible for DNA to be copied relatively simply, while accurately preserving its information content. [more...] New Draft of the Week [ about ] Although bound up with the tradition of the ‘special library’, information management differs from such earlier concepts in its focus on all kinds of information and a concern for the relationship between information provision and organizational performance. In many special libraries there had long been responsibility for managing internal documentation of various kinds, especially research reports. The history of this development is usefully explored by Black, Muddiman and Plant [1] who note the emergence of information management concepts following the end of the First World War, with the formal organization of ‘information bureaux’ in the establishment of ASLIB (the Association of Special Libraries and Information Bureaux) in the UK in 1924. Some techniques, however, were even older, witness Kaiser’s work on indexing [2][3]. Indeed, we can date many of the ideas of what is now called ‘information management’ (although ‘documentation’ is used as a near equivalent in much of Europe) to the founding by Otlet and La Fontaine of the International Institute of Bibliography in 1895 [more...]