19-letter words containing a, b, i, l
- line-of-battle ship — ship of the line.
- load-bearing printf — (programming, humour) The kind of bug present in a program which works correctly when producing debug output but fails when the debugging is turned off. The expression combines load-bearing wall and printf as used in debugging by printf.
- lobster-tail helmet — a burgonet fitted with a long, articulated tail of lames for protecting the nape of the neck, worn by cavalry in the 17th century.
- logical unit number — (storage) (LUN) A 3-bit identifier used on a SCSI bus to distinguish between up to eight devices (logical units) with the same SCSI ID.
- lord baltimore cake — a yellow layer cake, using only the yolks of eggs and having a fruit-nut filling consisting of pecans, almonds, maraschino cherries, and macaroon crumbs.
- malleable cast iron — white cast iron that has been malleablized.
- mercurial barometer — mercury barometer.
- mexican bean beetle — a ladybird beetle, Epilachna varivestis, introduced into the U.S. from Mexico, that feeds on the foliage of the bean plant.
- molecular biologist — a specialist in the study of biological phenomena at the molecular level
- monoclonal antibody — antibody produced by a laboratory-grown cell clone, either of a hybridoma or a virus-transformed lymphocyte, that is more abundant and uniform than natural antibody and is able to bind specifically to a single site on almost any chosen antigen or reveal previously unknown antigen sites: used as an analytic tool in scientific research and medical diagnosis and potentially important in the treatment of certain diseases. Abbreviation: MAb.
- mordvinian republic — a constituent republic of W central Russia, in the middle Volga basin. Capital: Saransk. Pop: 888 700 (2002). Area: 26 200 sq km (10 110 sq miles)
- municipal bond fund — a mutual fund that invests in municipal bonds.
- mutual masturbation — the act of two or more people masturbating each other
- mutual savings bank — a noncapitalized savings bank that distributes its net earnings to depositors.
- naberezhniye chelny — city in E European Russia, on the Kama River: pop. 514,000
- national book award — any of several awards given annually, 1949–79, to an author whose book was judged the best in its category: administered by the Association of American Publishers. Abbreviation: NBA, N.B.A.
- national coal board — a statutory corporation set up to run Britain's nationalised coal mining industry between 1947 and 1994, at which time the industry was privatized
- negation by failure — An extralogical feature of Prolog and other logic programming languages in which failure of unification is treated as establishing the negation of a relation. For example, if Ronald Reagan is not in our database and we asked if he was an American, Prolog would answer "no".
- neville chamberlain — (Arthur) Neville, 1869–1940, British statesman: prime minister 1937–40.
- nominative absolute — a construction consisting in English of a noun, noun phrase, or pronoun in the nominative case followed by a predicate lacking a finite verb, used as a loose modifier of the whole sentence, as the play done in The play done, the audience left the theater.
- non-distinguishable — to mark off as different (often followed by from or by): He was distinguished from the other boys by his height.
- non-transferability — to convey or remove from one place, person, etc., to another: He transferred the package from one hand to the other.
- normal distribution — a theoretical frequency distribution represented by a normal curve.
- not by a long sight — on no account; not at all
- observation balloon — a balloon that is used for gathering information and reconnaissance purposes and spotting aircraft
- office-block ballot — a ballot on which the candidates are listed alphabetically, with or without their party designations, in columns under the office for which they were nominated.
- olive-backed thrush — Swainson's thrush.
- on the baker's list — in good health
- once in a blue moon — very rarely; almost never
- optical double star — two stars that appear as one if not viewed through a telescope with adequate magnification, such as two stars that are separated by a great distance but are nearly in line with each other and an observer (optical double star) or those that are relatively close together and comprise a single physical system (physical double star)
- palaeoethnobotanist — someone who studies fossil seeds and grains to further archaeological knowledge, esp of the domestication of cereals
- papal infallibility — the dogma that the pope cannot err in a solemn teaching addressed to the whole church on a matter of faith or morals.
- paradichlorobenzene — a white, crystalline, volatile, water-insoluble solid, C 6 H 4 Cl 2 , of the benzene series, having a penetrating odor: used chiefly as a moth repellent.
- parliament building — structure housing legislative offices
- perfoliate bellwort — a slender plant, Uvularia perfoliata, of the lily family, of eastern North America, having pale yellow, bell-shaped flowers.
- peridental membrane — periodontal membrane.
- personal belongings — possessions; things that belong to someone
- phenylthiocarbamide — a crystalline, slightly water-soluble solid, C 6 H 5 NHCSNH 2 , that is either tasteless or bitter, depending upon the heredity of the taster, and is used in medical genetics and as a diagnostic.
- phthalocyanine blue — a pigment used in painting, derived from copper phthalocyanine and characterized chiefly by its brilliant, dark-blue color and by permanence.
- pointe-aux-trembles — a city in S Quebec, in E Canada, N of Montreal, on the St. Lawrence.
- polycarboxylic acid — a type of carboxylic acid containing two or more carboxyl groups
- polyclonal antibody — a mixture of antibodies of different specificities, as in the serum of a person immunized to various antigens.
- postal savings bank — any of the savings banks formerly operated by local post offices and limited to small accounts.
- potassium bisulfate — a colorless, crystalline, water-soluble solid, KHSO 4 , used chiefly in the conversion of tartrates to bitartrates.
- profitability study — a study of how much profit a company, organization, etc, makes or how profitable it is
- pseudo-biographical — of or relating to a person's life: He's gathering biographical data for his book on Milton.
- public intellectual — an intellectual, often a noted specialist in a particular field, who has become well-known to the general public for a willingness to comment on current affairs
- public-interest law — a branch of law that often utilizes class-action suits to protect the interest of a large group or of the public at large, as in matters relating to racial discrimination, air pollution, etc.
- rag-tag and bobtail — the riffraff; rabble: The ragtag and bobtail of every nation poured into the frontier in search of gold.
- refreshable display — braille display