aspen

aspen, in botany

aspen: see willow.

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Aspen, city, United States

Aspen (ăs`pən), city (1990 pop. 5,049), alt. 7,850 ft (2,390 m), seat of Pitkin co., S central Colo., on the Roaring Fork River; founded c.1879 by silver prospectors, inc. 1881. Declining after an 1880s–90s boom, it was transformed in the 1930s into a ski resort. Affluent, cosmopolitan Aspen is now noted for its Aspen Institute for Humanistic Studies and Aspen Music School. Its summer music festival was the progenitor (1949) of similar arts festivals throughout the mountain states.

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aspen

Any of three tree species of the genus Populus, of the willow family: P. tremula (the common European aspen), P. tremuloides (the American quaking, or trembling, aspen), and P. grandidentata (the American big-tooth aspen). Native to the Northern Hemisphere, aspens are known for the fluttering of their leaves in the slightest breeze. Aspens grow farther north and higher up the mountains than other Populus species. All aspens have a smooth, gray-green bark, random branching, rich green leaves that turn brilliant yellow in fall, and catkins that appear before the leaves in spring.

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Aspen

City (pop., 2000: 5,914), western central Colorado, U.S. It is located on the Roaring Fork River at the edge of the White River National Forest, at an altitude of 7,907 ft (2,410 m). Founded by prospectors c. 1878, it was a booming silver-mining town by 1887 but declined rapidly after silver prices collapsed in the early 1890s. Its revival as a ski resort began in the late 1930s, and it is now a popular tourist town; it is also known for its cultural festivals, notably the Aspen Music Festival.

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Aspen

(Aspen Technology, Inc., Burlington, MA, www.aspentec.com) A leading provider of smart manufacturing and supply chain management software and services for the process industries, which includes chemicals, metals and minerals, pulp and paper, electric power and consumer packaged goods. Aspen was founded in 1981 to commercialize technology developed by the Advanced System for Process Engineering (ASPEN) at MIT. From 1976 to 1981, the ASPEN project was funded by the U.S. Department of Energy and a group of more than 50 industrial participants, after which it went public.

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aspen

any of several trees of the salicaceous genus Populus, such as P. tremula of Europe, in which the leaves are attached to the stem by long flattened stalks so that they quiver in the wind

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aspen [′as·pən]

(botany)

Any of several species of poplars (Populus) characterized by weak, flattened leaf stalks which cause the leaves to flutter in the slightest breeze.

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(language)

ASPEN - A toy language for teaching compiler construction. ["ASPEN Language Specifications", T.R. Wilcox, SIGPLAN Notices 12(11):70-87, Nov 1977].