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Possible definitions for haar

Haas
U.S. linguist. Born in Richmond, Ind., she studied with E. Sapir at Yale Univ. Her dissertation was on Tunica, a moribund Amer. Indian language, and she continued her fieldwork on and comparative studies of Amer. Indian languages, especially of the SE U.S., incl. Natchez and Muskogean languages, for the rest of her life. She directed the Survey of California Indian Languages while on the UC-Berkeley faculty (1945-77). Her many students have done invaluable descriptive work on languages heading rapidly for extinction.


hair
Threadlike outgrowths of the skin. Babies shed a layer of downy, slender hairs (lanugo) before or just after birth. The fine, short, unpigmented hairs (vellus) then grow. Starting at puberty, terminal hair, longer, coarser, and more pigmented, develops in the armpits, crotch, sometimes on parts of the trunk and limbs, and, in males, on the face. Scalp hair, eyebrows, and eyelashes are different types. The number of scalp hairs, which grow about 0.5 in. (13 mm) per month, averages 100,000-150,000. The hair shaft (above the skin) is dead tissue, composed of keratin. Only a few growing cells at the base of the root are alive. Hair is formed by cell division at the base of the follicle (a tiny pocket in the skin), part of a cycle of growing, resting, and falling out. Vellus lasts about four months, scalp hairs three to five years.


harai
Purification ceremonies in the Shinto religion, used to cleanse an individual before he may approach a deity. Salt, water, and fire are the chief agents of purification, and the rites range from bathing in the cold sea to washing the hands before entering a temple. Priests undergo more rigorous harai rites intended to regulate the body, heart, environment, and soul. Great purification ceremonies are held twice a year in Japan, on June 30 and December 31.


heart
Organ that pumps blood, circulating it to all parts of the body (see circulation). The human heart is a four-chambered double pump with its right and left sides fully separated by a septum and subdivided on both sides into an atrium above and a ventricle below. The right heart receives venous blood from the superior and inferior venae cavae (see vena cava) and propels it into the pulmonary circulation. The left heart takes in blood from the pulmonary veins and sends it into the systemic circulation. Electrical signals from a natural pacemaker cause the heart muscle to contract. Valves in the heart keep blood flowing in one direction. Their snapping shut after each contraction causes the sounds heard as the heartbeat. See also cardiovascular system.


air
Mixture of gases constituting the earth's atmosphere. Some gases occur in steady concentrations. The most important are molecular nitrogen (N2), 78% by volume, and molecular oxygen (O2), 21%. Small amounts of argon (Ar; 1.9%), neon (Ne), helium (He), methane (CH4), krypton (Kr), hydrogen (H2), ...

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