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Amber

Specialty Definition: Amber

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Specialty Definition: AMBER

(From Wikipedia, the free Encyclopedia)

AMBER (Assisted Model Building and Energy Refinement) is a force field for molecular dynamics developed by Peter Kollman's group in the University of California, San Francisco. AMBER is also the name for the molecular dynamics simulation package associated with this force field.

External link

• AMBER

  Source: adapted by the editor from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia under a copyleft GNU Free Documentation License (GFDL) from the article "AMBER."

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Amber

(From Wikipedia, the free Encyclopedia)

This is about the material called amber. For other things called amber, see Amber (disambiguation).

Amber pendants. The oval pendant is 52 by 32 mm (2 by 1.3 inches). Larger version

Amber is a fossil resin much used for the manufacture of ornamental objects. Although not mineralized it is sometimes considered and used as a gemstone. The name comes from the Arabic anbar, probably through the Spanish, but this word referred originally to ambergris, which is an animal substance quite distinct from yellow amber. True amber has sometimes been called karabe, a word of oriental derivation signifying "that which attracts straw", in allusion to the power which amber possesses of acquiring an electric charge by friction. This property, first recorded by Thales of Miletus, suggested the word "electricity", from the Greek, elektron, a name applied, however, not only to amber but also to an alloy of gold and silver. By Latin writers amber is variously called electrum, sucinum (succinum), and glaesum or glesum. The Old Hebrew hashmal seems to have meant amber, although Modern Hebrew uses Arabic-inspired i'nbar.

Amber is heterogeneous in composition, but consists of several resinous bodies more or less soluble in alcohol, ether and chloroform, associated with an insoluble bituminous substance. The average composition of amber leads to the general formula C₁₀H₁₆O. Heated rather below 300°C, amber suffers decomposition, yielding an "oil of amber", and leaving a black residue which is known as "amber colophony", or "amber pitch"; when dissolved in oil of turpentine or in linseed oil this forms "amber varnish" or "amber lac".

True amber yields on dry distillation succinic acid, the proportion varying from about 3 to 8%, and being greatest in the pale opaque or bony varieties. The aromatic and irritating fumes emitted by burning amber are mainly due to this acid. True Baltic amber is distinguished by its yield of succinic acid, for many of the other fossil resins which are often termed amber contain either none of it, or only a very small proportion; hence the name succinite proposed by Professor J. D. Dana, and now commonly used in scientific writings as a specific term for the real Prussian amber. Succinite has a hardness between 2 and 3, which is rather greater than that of many other fossil resins. Its specific gravity varies from 1.05 to 1.10.

The Baltic amber or succinite is found as irregular nodules in a marine glauconitic sand, known as blue earth, occurring in the Lower Oligocene strata of Samland in East Prussia, where it is now systematically mined. It appears, however, to have been partly derived from yet earlier Tertiary deposits (Eocene); and it occurs also as a derivative mineral in later formations, such as the drift. Relics of an abundant flora occur in association with the amber, suggesting relations with the flora of Eastern Asia and the southern part of North America. H. R. Goppert named the common amber-yielding pine of the Baltic forests Pinites succiniter, but as the wood, according to some authorities, does not seem to differ from that of the existing genus it has been also called Pinius succinifera. It is improbable, however, that the production of amber was limited to a single species; and indeed a large number of conifers belonging to different genera are represented in the amber-flora.

An insect trapped in amber. The amber piece is 10 mm (0.4 inches) long. In the enlarged picture, the insect's antennae are easily seen. Larger version

The resin contains, in addition to the beautifully preserved plant-structures, numerous remains of insects, spiders, annelids, crustaceans and other small organisms which became enveloped while the exudation was fluid. In most cases the organic structure has disappeared, leaving only a cavity, with perhaps a trace of chitin. Even hair and feathers have occasionally been represented among the enclosures. Fragments of wood not infrequently occur, with the tissues well-preserved by impregnation with the resin; while leaves, flowers and fruits are occasionally found in marvellous perfection. Sometimes the amber retains the form of drops and stalactites, just as it exuded from the ducts and receptacles of the injured trees. The abnormal development of resin has been called succinosis. Impurities are often present, especially when the resin dropped on to the ground, so that the material may be useless except for varnish-making, whence the impure amber is called firniss. Enclosures of pyrites may give a bluish colour to amber. The so-called black amber is only a kind of jet. Bony amber owes its cloudy opacity to minute bubbles in the interior of the resin.

Although amber is found along the shores of a large part of the Baltic Sea and the North Sea, the great amber-producing country is the promontory of Samland. Pieces of amber torn from the sea-floor are cast up by the waves, and collected at ebb-tide. Sometimes the searchers wade into the sea, furnished with nets at the end of long poles, by means of which they drag in the sea-weed containing entangled masses of amber; or they dredge from boats in shallow water and rake up amber from between the boulders. Divers have been employed to collect amber from the deeper waters. Systematic dredging on a large scale was at one time carried on in the Kurisches Haff by Messrs Stantien and Becker, the great amber merchants of Königsberg. At the present time extensive mining operations are conducted in quest of amber. The pit amber was formerly dug in open works, but is now also worked by underground galleries. The nodules from the blue earth have to be freed from matrix and divested of their opaque crust, which can be done in revolving barrels containing sand and water. The sea-worn amber has lost its crust, but has often acquired a dull rough surface by rolling in sand.

Amber is extensively used for beads and other trivial ornaments, and for cigar-holders and the mouth-pieces of pipes. It is regarded by the Turks as specially valuable, inasmuch as it is said to be incapable of transmitting infection as the pipe passes from mouth to mouth. The variety most valued in the East is the pale straw-coloured, slightly cloudy amber. Some of the best qualities are sent to Vienna for the manufacture of smoking appliances. In working amber, it is turned on the lathe and polished with whitening and water or with rotten stone and oil, the final lustre being given by friction with flannel. During the working much electricity is developed.

When gradually heated in an oil-bath amber becomes soft and flexible. Two pieces of amber may be united by smearing the surfaces with linseed oil, heating them, and then pressing them together while hot. Cloudy amber may be clarified in an oil-bath, as the oil fills the numerous pores to which the turbidity is due. Small fragments, formerly thrown away or used only for varnish, are now utilized on a large scale in the formation of "ambroid" or "pressed amber". The pieces are carefully heated with exclusion of air and then compressed into a uniform mass by intense hydraulic pressure; the softened amber being forced through holes in a metal plate. The product is extensively used for the production of cheap jewellery and articles for smoking. This pressed amber yields brilliant interference colours in polarized light. Amber has often been imitated by other resins like copal and kauri, as well as by celluloid and even glass. True amber is sometimes coloured artificially.

Amber was much valued as an ornamental material in very early times. It has been found in Mycenaean tombs; it is known from lake-dwellings in Switzerland, and it occurs with neolithic remains in Denmark, whilst in England it is found with interments of the bronze age. A remarkably fine cup turned in amber from a bronze-age barrow at Hove is now in the Brighton Museum. Beads of amber occur with Anglo-Saxon relics in the south of England; and up to a comparatively recent period the material was valued as an amulet. It is still believed to possess a certain medicinal virtue.

Rolled pieces of amber, usually small but occasionally of very large size, may be picked up on the east coast of England, having probably been washed up from deposits under the North Sea. Cromer is the best-known locality, but it occurs also on other parts of the Norfolk coast, as well as at Yarmouth, Southwold, Aldeburgh and Felixstowe in Suffolk, and as far south as Walton-on-the-Naze in Essex, whilst northwards it is not unknown in Yorkshire. On the other side of the North Sea, amber is found at various localities on the coast of the Netherlands and Denmark. On the shores of the Baltic it occurs not only on the Prussian and Pomeranian coast but in the south of Sweden, in Bornholm and other islands, and in southern Finland. Amber has indeed a very wide distribution, extending over a large part of northern Europe and occurring as far east as the Urals. Some of the amber districts of the Baltic and North Sea were known in prehistoric times, and led to early trade with the south of Europe. Amber was carried to Olbia on the Black Sea, Massilia (today Marseille) on the Mediterranean, and Hatria at the head of the Adriatic; and from these centres it was distributed over the Hellenic world.

Whilst succinite is the common variety of European amber, the following varieties also occur: --

• Gedanite, or brittle amber, closely resembling succinite, but much more brittle, not quite so hard, with a lower melting- point and containing no succinic acid. It is often covered with a white powder easily removed by wiping. The name comes from Gedanum, the Latin name of Danzig at the Baltic Sea.

• Stantienite, a brittle, deep brownish-black resin, destitute of succinic acid.

• Beckerite, a rare amber in earthy-brown nodules, almost opaque, said to be related in properties to gutta-percha.

• Glessite, a nearly opaque brown resin, with numerous microscopic cavities and dusty enclosures, named from glesum, an old name for amber.

• Krantzite, a soft amber-like resin, found in the lignites of Saxony.

• Allingite, a fossil resin allied to succinite, from Switzerland.

• Roumanite, or Romanian amber, a dark reddish resin, occurring with lignite in Tertiary deposits. The nodules are penetrated by cracks, but the material can be worked on the lathe. Sulphur is present to the extent of more than 1%, whence the smell of sulphuretted hydrogen when the resin is heated. According to Gheorghe Murgoci the Romanian amber is true succinite.

• Simetite, or Sicilian amber, takes its name from the river Simeto or Giaretta. It occurs in Miocene deposits and is also found washed up by the sea near Catania. This beautiful material presents a great diversity of tints, but a rich hyacinth red is common. It is remarkable for its fluorescence, which in the opinion of some authorities adds to its beauty. Amber is also found in many localities in Emilia, especially near the sulphur-mines of Cesena. It has been conjectured that the ancient Etruscan ornaments in amber were wrought in the Italian material, but it seems that amber from the Baltic reached the Etruscans at Hatria. It has even been supposed that amber passed from Sicily to northern Europe in early times -- a supposition said to receive some support from the fact that much of the amber dug up in Denmark is red; but it must not be forgotten that reddish amber is found also on the Baltic, though not being fashionable it is used rather for varnish-making than for ornaments. Moreover, yellow amber after long burial is apt to acquire a reddish colour. The amber of Sicily seems not to have been recognized in ancient times, for it is not mentioned by local authorities like Diodorus Siculus.

• Burmite is the name under which the Burmese amber is now described. Until the British occupation of Burma but little was known as to its occurrence, though it had been worked for centuries and was highly valued by the natives and by the Chinese. It is found in fiat rolled pieces, irregularly distributed through a blue clay probably of Miocene age. It occurs in the Hukawng valley, in the Nangotaimaw hills, where it is irregularly worked in shallow pits. The mines were visited some years ago by Dr Fritz Noetling, and the mineral has been described by Dr Otto Helm. The Burmese amber is yellow or reddish, some being of ruby tint, and like the Sicilian amber it is fluorescent. Burmite and simetite agree also in being destitute of succinic acid. Most of the Burmese amber is worked at Mandalay into rosary-beads and ear-cylinders.

Many other fossil resins more or less allied to amber have been described. Schraufite is a reddish resin from the Carpathian sandstone, and it occurs with jet in the Cretaceous rocks of the Lebanon; ambrite is a resin found in many of the coals of New Zealand; retinite occurs in the lignite of Bovey Tracey in Devonshire and elsewhere; whilst copaline has been found in the London clay of Highgate in North London. Chemawinite or cedarite is an amber-like resin from the Saskatchewan river in Canada.

Amber and certain similar substances are found to a limited extent at several localities in the United States, as in the green-sand of New Jersey, but they have little or no economic value. A fluorescent amber is said, however, to occur in some abundance in Southern Mexico. Amber is recorded also from the Dominican Republic.

See also: List of minerals

Source: adapted by the editor from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia under a copyleft GNU Free Documentation License (GFDL) from the article "Amber."

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Amber (city)

(From Wikipedia, the free Encyclopedia)

Amber is a ruined city of India, the ancient capital of Jaipur state in the Rajputana agency.

The name of Amber is first mentioned by Ptolemy. It was founded by the Meenas and was still flourishing in A.D. 967. In 1037 it was taken by the Rajputs, who held it till it was deserted. In 1728 it was supplanted by the modern city of Jaipur, from which it is 5 miles distant.

The picturesque situation of Amber at the mouth of a rocky mountain gorge, in which nestles a lovely lake, has attracted the admiration of all travellers, including Jacquemont and Heber. It is now only remarkable for its architecture. The old palace begun by Man Sing in 1600 ranks second only to Gwalior. The chief building is the Diwan-i-Khas built by Mirza Raja.

"No sooner," it is related "had Mirza completed the Diwan-i-Khas than it came to the ears of the emperor Jehangir that his vassal had surpassed him in magnificence, and that this last great work quite eclipsed all the marvels of the imperial city; the columns of red sandstone having been particularly noticed as sculptured with exquisite taste and elaborate detail. In a fit of jealousy the emperor commanded that this masterpiece should be thrown down, and sent commissioners to Amber charged with the execution of this order; whereupon Mirza, in order to save the structure, had the columns plastered over with stucco, so that the messengers from Agra should have to acknowledge to the emperor that the magnificence, which had been so much talked of, was after all pure invention. Since then his apathetic successors have neglected to bring to light this splendid work; and it is only by knocking off some of the plaster that one can get a glimpse of the sculptures, which are perfect as on the day they were carved."

initial article from A 1911 encyclopedia

Source: adapted by the editor from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia under a copyleft GNU Free Documentation License (GFDL) from the article "Amber (city)."

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Amber (disambiguation)

(From Wikipedia, the free Encyclopedia)

Amber can refer to several different things:

• Amber, the material.
• AMBER, the molecular dynamics force field and software package.
• Amber (beer), the Polish beer.
• Amber (chicken), the breed of chicken.
• Amber (city), the ancient Indian city.
• Amber (fictional realm), Roger Zelazny's fictional universe.
• Amber (performer), the pop music performer.

Source: adapted by the editor from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia under a copyleft GNU Free Documentation License (GFDL) from the article "Amber (disambiguation)."

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Amber (fictional realm)

(From Wikipedia, the free Encyclopedia)

The fictional realm of Amber is the setting for the Amber fantasy novels by Roger Zelazny (and for the Amber diceless role-playing game game they inspired).

In the Amber stories, Amber and the Courts of Chaos are the only two true worlds; all others, including our Earth, are but "shadows" of the tension between them. Royals of Amber (as well as equivalent Chaos nobility) can freely travel through the shadows and alter them, but they cannot do so to Amber itself.

Source: adapted by the editor from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia under a copyleft GNU Free Documentation License (GFDL) from the article "Amber (fictional realm)."

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Amber, Oklahoma

(From Wikipedia, the free Encyclopedia)

Amber is a town located in Grady County, Oklahoma. As of the 2000 census, the town had a total population of 490.

Geography

Amber is located at 35°9'35" North, 97°52'44" West (35.159613, -97.878766)¹. According to the United States Census Bureau, the town has a total area of 10.2 km² (4.0 mi²). 10.2 km² (4.0 mi²) of it is land and none of the area is covered with water.

Demographics

As of the census of 2000, there are 490 people, 160 households, and 132 families residing in the town. The population density is 47.9/km² (124.2/mi²). There are 176 housing units at an average density of 17.2/km² (44.6/mi²). The racial makeup of the town is 89.18% White, 0.20% African American, 4.90% Native American, 0.00% Asian, 1.22% Pacific Islander, 0.20% from other races, and 4.29% from two or more races. 2.04% of the population are Hispanic or Latino of any race. There are 160 households out of which 47.5% have children under the age of 18 living with them, 74.4% are married couples living together, 7.5% have a female householder with no husband present, and 16.9% are non-families. 15.6% of all households are made up of individuals and 5.0% have someone living alone who is 65 years of age or older. The average household size is 3.06 and the average family size is 3.34. In the town the population is spread out with 34.9% under the age of 18, 6.9% from 18 to 24, 29.8% from 25 to 44, 20.0% from 45 to 64, and 8.4% who are 65 years of age or older. The median age is 29 years. For every 100 females there are 96.8 males. For every 100 females age 18 and over, there are 95.7 males. The median income for a household in the town is $32,083, and the median income for a family is $34,688. Males have a median income of $24,531 versus $20,375 for females. The per capita income for the town is $12,012. 10.8% of the population and 9.7% of families are below the poverty line. Out of the total people living in poverty, 9.2% are under the age of 18 and 22.2% are 65 or older.

Source: adapted by the editor from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia under a copyleft GNU Free Documentation License (GFDL) from the article "Amber, Oklahoma."

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Synonyms within Context: Amber

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Modern Usage: Amber

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Commercial Usage: Amber

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Image Slideshow: Amber

Illustrations: Amber More pictures...

Computer Images: Amber More pictures...

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Photo Album: Amber

Thumbnail	Description & Credit	Thumbnail	Description & Credit
	Two technicians in lab coats are examining plates and tissue culture flasks at a laminar flow hood. The lighting has a soft amber glow. Credit: Unknown photographer/artist.		Amber Bilak (left), Earth Team Volunteer, and Janice Richardson, NRCS Soil Conservation Technician, review a conservation plan near a peach orchard in Santaquin, UT. [Slide 97CS3147]. Credit: Ron Nichols.
	Janice Richardson (left), NRCS Soil Conservation Technician, and Amber Bilak, Earth Team Volunteer assess irrigation efficiency on a side wheel roll sprinkler in an alfalfa field near Santaquin, UT. [Slide 97CS3148]. Credit: Ron Nichols.		As an NRCS Earth Team volunteer, Amber Bilak works side-by-side with NRCS professionals on a wide variety of field engineering practices. Here, Amber holds an engineering rod in American Fork River in UT. [Slide 97CS3184]. Credit: Ron Nichols.
	Earth Team volunteer Amber Bilak, left, and Janice Richardson, a soil conservation technician with the NRCS in Provo, Utah review a conservation plan near a peach orchard in Santaquin, Utah. Credit: USDA.		Janice Richardson, left, a soil conservation technician with the NRCS in Provo, Utah works with Earth Team volunteer Amber Bilak as they set up surveying equipment. Credit: USDA.
	Amber Sweet hybrid oranges. Credit: USDA.		In the City of Amber. Credit: Library of Congress.
	Roxy usherettes (l to r) Marie Prange, Sheilah Knox, and Jo Ann De Santis dispense coffee and doughnuts to line of movie patrons headed by Mrs. Lily Vieder, at the premiere of "Forever Amber" outside the Roxy Theater, New York City. Credit: Library of Congress.
Source: pictures compiled by the editor from various references; see picture credits.

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Digital Photo Gallery: Amber
 

"Amber maple" by Jamon Walker Commentary: "Sunlight filtered thru glass onto maple floor. Great background for many uses."

Source: photographs selected by the editor, with permission from the photographers.

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Familiar Quotations: Amber

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Usage Frequency: Amber

Source: compiled by the editor from several corpora; see credits.

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Name Usage Frequency: Amber

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Usage in Company Names: Amber

Source: compiled by the editor from Icon Group International, Inc.

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Cities: Amber