Merchant shipA merchant ship, merchant vessel, trading vessel, or merchantman is a watercraft that transports cargo or carries passengers for hire. This is in contrast to pleasure craft, which are used for personal recreation, and naval ships, which are used for military purposes. They come in myriad sizes and shapes, from inflatable dive boats in Hawaii, to 5,000-passenger casino vessels on the Mississippi River, to tugboats plying New York Harbor, to oil tankers and container ships at major ports, to passenger-carrying submarines in the Caribbean.
Container shipA container ship (also called boxship or spelled containership) is a cargo ship that carries all of its load in truck-size intermodal containers, in a technique called containerization. Container ships are a common means of commercial intermodal freight transport and now carry most seagoing non-bulk cargo. Container ship capacity is measured in twenty-foot equivalent units (TEU). Typical loads are a mix of 20-foot (1-TEU) and 40-foot (2-TEU) ISO-standard containers, with the latter predominant.
Intermodal freight transportIntermodal freight transport involves the transportation of freight in an intermodal container or vehicle, using multiple modes of transportation (e.g., rail, ship, aircraft, and truck), without any handling of the freight itself when changing modes. The method reduces cargo handling, and so improves security, reduces damage and loss, and allows freight to be transported faster. Reduced costs over road trucking is the key benefit for inter-continental use. This may be offset by reduced timings for road transport over shorter distances.
Upper half-planeIn mathematics, the upper half-plane, is the set of points in the Cartesian plane with The lower half-plane is defined similarly, by requiring that be negative instead. Each is an example of two-dimensional half-space. The affine transformations of the upper half-plane include shifts , , and dilations , . Proposition: Let and be semicircles in the upper half-plane with centers on the boundary. Then there is an affine mapping that takes to . Proof: First shift the center of to . Then take and dilate.
Refrigerated containerA refrigerated container or reefer is an intermodal container (shipping container) used in intermodal freight transport that is capable of refrigeration for the transportation of temperature-sensitive, perishable cargo such as fruits, vegetables, meat, and other similar items. While a reefer will have an integral refrigeration unit, they rely on external power, from electrical power points (“reefer points”) at a land-based site, a container ship or on quay.
Rail freight transportRail freight transport is the use of railroads and trains to transport cargo as opposed to human passengers. A freight train, cargo train, or goods train is a group of freight cars (US) or goods wagons (International Union of Railways) hauled by one or more locomotives on a railway, transporting cargo all or some of the way between the shipper and the intended destination as part of the logistics chain. Trains may haul bulk material, intermodal containers, general freight or specialized freight in purpose-designed cars.
Less-than-truckload shippingLess-than-truckload shipping or less than load (LTL) is the transportation of an amount of freight sized between individual parcels and full truckloads. Parcel carriers handle small packages and freight that can be broken down into units less than approximately . Full truckload carriers move entire semi-trailers. Semi-trailers are typically between and require a substantial amount of freight to make such transportation economical. The term LTL can refer to the freight itself, or to the carrier that transports the such freight.
Maritime transportMaritime transport (or ocean transport) or more generally waterborne transport, is the transport of people (passengers) or goods (cargo) via waterways. Freight transport by sea has been widely used throughout recorded history. The advent of aviation has diminished the importance of sea travel for passengers, though it is still popular for short trips and pleasure cruises. Transport by water is cheaper than transport by air or ground, but significantly slower for longer distances.
Circuit designThe process of circuit design can cover systems ranging from complex electronic systems down to the individual transistors within an integrated circuit. One person can often do the design process without needing a planned or structured design process for simple circuits. Still, teams of designers following a systematic approach with intelligently guided computer simulation are becoming increasingly common for more complex designs.
Multimodal transportMultimodal transport (also known as combined transport) is the transportation of goods under a single contract, but performed with at least two different modes of transport; the carrier is liable (in a legal sense) for the entire carriage, even though it is performed by several different modes of transport (by rail, sea and road, for example). The carrier does not have to possess all the means of transport, and in practice usually does not; the carriage is often performed by sub-carriers (referred to in legal language as "actual carriers").
