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"Plant" refers to familiar land plants, and also to aquatic plants, mosses, liverworts and algae plants. Although not technically plants, fungi and bacteria are often included. Palaeobotany is the study of ancient plant life using fossil evidence. Plant fossils are found coast-to-coast in Canada, from 45-million-year-old mosses in British Columbia to fossil forests on Axel Heiberg and Ellesmere islands in the Canadian Arctic.

Water Distribution System, a provincially regulated network used to distribute water from a central location to a location of end use.

Medical ethics are concerned with moral questions raised by the practice of medicine and, more generally, by health care.

The Nova Scotia Nautical Institute was an institute for seamanship training founded in 1872. It was common in England and Canada, which followed England in marine matters, to have people called "crammers" to assist mariners to pass their examinations, following apprenticeship on board ship.

Marie Rollet Hébert [Hubou] has been credited with being the first person in what is now Canada to provide nursing care to the sick. The wife of Louis HÉBERT, a surgeon-apothecary, she arrived in Québec in 1617 and assisted her husband in caring for the sick.

The first organized mineral exploration by Europeans in what is now Canada was led by Martin FROBISHER in his 3 expeditions to Baffin Island (1576, 1577 and 1578).

Algoma Steel Inc. is a major steel producer based in Sault Ste. Marie, Ontario. Its principal products are steel plate and sheet for various industries, including automotive, construction and manufacturing. The company employs more than 2,900 people in Sault Ste. Marie.

The Royal Commission on Transportation (MacPherson Commission) was appointed by the federal government (1959) to investigate transportation policy, particularly freight-rate inequities.

Stem cells are the body's "building blocks"; they are the cells from which all tissues and organs are derived. They have the ability to divide while still maintaining their identity, yet they can also develop into specialized cells in response to certain stimuli.

Metric conversion was the process of making metric units — such as metre, kilogram and degree Celsius — the common units of measurement in Canada, leaving the British imperial system (with units such as yard, gallon and pound) behind. The process was fraught with political interference and public resistance, and took place incrementally between 1970 and the early 1980s. Despite the shift, many Canadians still express certain measurements in imperial units, such as height (feet and inches).

Garbage, see SOLID WASTE; WASTE DISPOSAL.

Coal demethanation is a process by which methane gas is removed from coal deposits. The principal objective of coal demethanation, since its introduction in 1943, has been to remove the safety hazard the gas poses to miners.

Cryptozoology is the scientific study of unknown animals about which only circumstantial, or at best insufficient, material evidence is available.

Communications influence all societies, but Canada in particular takes its shape and meaning from communications systems.

The Challenger expedition, the first worldwide oceanographic expedition, voyaged 127 663 km in the Atlantic, Southern, Indian and Pacific oceans between December 1872 and May 1876.

Climate information is used by a variety of people. Building designers must be certain that their structures will withstand the strongest winds and be habitable during temperature extremes. Airlines, when possible, plan their routes to take advantage of the prevailing winds in the upper atmosphere.

The manufacture of clocks and watches in Canada may have begun as early as 1700; however, practising watch and clockmakers through the 18th and much of the 19th centuries did not make the movements.

The Iron Ring is a symbol of professional duty and obligation worn by Canadian engineers. The tradition began in 1922 when a group of Montréal engineers met to consider the solidarity of, and a means for providing guidance to, their profession.

The Royal Canadian Institute is now the oldest surviving scientific society in Canada. It was founded in 1849 by a small group of civil engineers, architects and surveyors led by Sir Sandford FLEMING.

Although the Scandinavians claim to have pioneered the RO-RO concept, the first purpose-built RO-RO ferry was the Motor Princess, launched at Esquimalt, BC, in 1923 for Canadian Pacific. It ended its long career with British Columbia Ferry Corporation in the 1970s as the Pender Queen.