Victoria (plant)

Victoria is a genus of water-lilies, in the plant family Nymphaeaceae, with very large green leaves that lie flat on the water's surface. Victoria amazonica has a leaf that is up to 3 metres (9.8 ft) in diameter, on a stalk up to 8 metres (26 ft) in length. The genus name was given in honour of Queen Victoria of the United Kingdom.

Victoria amazonica is native to the shallow waters of the Amazon River basin, such as oxbow lakes and bayous. It is depicted in the Guyanese coat of arms. The flowers are white the first night they are open and become pink the second night. They are up to 40 cm in diameter, and are pollinated by scarab beetles.

Another species, Victoria cruziana, in the Parana-Paraguay basin, is only slightly smaller, with the underside of the leaves purple rather than the red of V. amazonica, and covered with a peachlike fuzz lacking in V. amazonica. V. cruziana opens its flowers at dusk.

The first published description of the genus was by John Lindley in 1837, based on specimens returned from British Guiana by Robert Schomburgk. Lindley named the genus after the new Queen, Victoria, and the species Victoria regia. An earlier account of the species, Euryale amazonica Poeppig, in 1832 described an affinity with Euryale ferox. A collection and description was also made by the French botanist Aimé Bonpland in 1825.

Plant

Plants, also called green plants, are multicellular eukaryotes of the kingdom Plantae. They form an unranked clade Viridiplantae (Latin for green plants) that includes the flowering plants, conifers and other gymnosperms, ferns, clubmosses, hornworts, liverworts, mosses and the green algae. Green plants excludes the red and brown algae, the fungi, archaea, bacteria and animals.

Green plants have cell walls with cellulose and obtain most of their energy from sunlight via photosynthesis by primary chloroplasts, derived from endosymbiosis with cyanobacteria. Their chloroplasts contain chlorophylls a and b, which gives them their green color. Some plants are parasitic and have lost the ability to produce normal amounts of chlorophyll or to photosynthesize. Plants are also characterized by sexual reproduction, modular and indeterminate growth, and an alternation of generations, although asexual reproduction is also common.

Precise numbers are difficult to determine, but as of 2010, there are thought to be 300–315 thousand species of plants, of which the great majority, some 260–290 thousand, are seed plants (see the table below). Green plants provide most of the world's molecular oxygen and are the basis of most of the earth's ecologies, especially on land. Plants that produce grains, fruits and vegetables form mankind's basic foodstuffs, and have been domesticated for millennia. Plants are used as ornaments and, until recently and in great variety, they have served as the source of most medicines and drugs. The scientific study of plants is known as botany, a branch of biology.

Plant (disambiguation)

A plant is a living organism that generally does not move and absorbs nutrients from its surroundings.

Plant may also refer to:

In manufacturing and engineering

In media and entertainment

In names

Trigun

Trigun (Japanese: トライガン, Hepburn: Toraigan) is a Japanese manga series written and illustrated by Yasuhiro Nightow. The manga was serialized in Tokuma Shoten's Shōnen Captain in 1996 with a total of 3 collected volumes when the magazine was discontinued in 1997. The series continued in Shōnen Gahosha's Young King Ours magazine, under the title Trigun Maximum (トライガンマキシマム, Toraigan Makishimamu), where it remained until finishing in 2008.

Both manga were adapted into an anime television series in 1998. The Madhouse Studios production aired on TV Tokyo from April 1, 1998 to September 30, 1998, totaling 26 episodes. An animated feature film was released in April 2010.

Plot

Trigun revolves around a man known as "Vash the Stampede" and two Bernardelli Insurance Society employees, Meryl Stryfe and Milly Thompson, who follow him around in order to minimize the damages inevitably caused by his appearance. Most of the damage attributed to Vash is actually caused by bounty hunters in pursuit of the sixty billion double dollar bounty on Vash's head for the destruction of the city of July. However, he cannot remember the incident due to retrograde amnesia, being able to recall only fragments of the destroyed city and memories of his childhood. Throughout his travels, Vash tries to save lives using non-lethal force. He is occasionally joined by a priest, Nicholas D. Wolfwood, who, like Vash, is a superb gunfighter with a mysterious past. As the series progresses, more about Vash's past and the history of human civilization on the planet Gunsmoke is revealed.

Cervecería Centro Americana

Cervecería Centro Americana Sociedad Anónima is a Guatemalan brewery based in Guatemala City, Guatemala. It was founded by Mariano Castillo Córdova and his brother, Rafael Castillo Córdova.

Products

Gallo

Gallo is a 5% abv pale lager. It is Guatemala's oldest continually produced beer, dating back to 1896. It is also the most famous beer in the country, and has become part of Guatemalan popular culture.

It is sold in 350 ml (12 U.S. fl oz; 12 imp fl oz) aluminum cans, 355 ml (12.0 U.S. fl oz; 12.5 imp fl oz) returnable bottles, 355 ml non-returnable bottles, and 1-liter (34 U.S. fl oz; 35 imp fl oz) returnable bottles. In recent years Gallo has been exported to other Central American countries, Mexico, France and the United States. It is sold under the name Famosa ("Famous") in the latter two. The label's design features a cockerel (Spanish: gallo).

Gallo has received several international certifications, including the gold medal certification "Monde Selection" from Belgium, in recognition for its outstanding quality . The brewery also claims to have received the "Prestige Award" and also claims to be the only 2 breweries in America to have received it.

Victoria (Nova Scotia provincial electoral district)

Victoria was a provincial electoral district in Nova Scotia, Canada, that elected one member of the Nova Scotia House of Assembly. It existed from 1867 to 2003.

References

Victoria Affair

The Victoria Affair (code name Operation Iron Law) was a military operation conducted by the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) in March 2011 in which the Israeli Navy intercepted the German-owned, Liberian-flagged vessel Victoria on the high seas, and discovered concealed weapons which, according to the IDF, were destined for Palestinian militant organizations in the Gaza Strip. The vessel was found to be carrying approximately 50 tons of weapons, including C-704 anti-ship missiles, rocket launchers, radar systems, mortar shells and rifle ammunition.

Background

Israel maintains a naval blockade of the Gaza Strip, to prevent the smuggling of arms into the hands of militant organizations based there. In 2003, Israeli commandos intercepted the Karine A in the Red Sea, and seized 50 tons of missiles, mortars, rifles and ammunition which it said were destined for Gaza. In 2009, the Israeli navy intercepted the Iranian vessel MV Francop off the coast of Cyprus, carrying hundreds of tons of weapons. Iran is Hamas's main arms provider, smuggling weapons overland through Sudan and Sinai in addition to using the sea route.