18-letter words containing a, b, l
- black nickel oxide — a gray-black, water-insoluble powder, Ni 2 O 3 , which, at 600°C, decomposes to nickel oxide: used chiefly in storage batteries as an oxidizing agent.
- black-necked grebe — a small grebe, Podiceps nigricollis, found in Europe, Asia, Africa, and America
- black-necked stork — a large Australian stork, Xenorhyncus asiaticus, having a white plumage, dark green back and tail, and red legs
- blackback flounder — any of various popular food flatfishes, as Parophrys vetulus of the Pacific (English sole) and Pseudopleuronectes americanus of the Atlantic (winter flounder or blackback flounder)
- blackwater rafting — the sport of riding through underground caves on a large rubber tube
- blanche of castile — ?1188–1252, queen consort (1223–26) of Louis VIII of France, born in Spain. The mother of Louis IX, she acted as regent during his minority (1226–36) and his absence on a crusade (1248–52)
- blanquette de veau — a ragout or stew of veal in a white sauce
- blissful ignorance — unawareness or inexperience of something unpleasant
- blocking capacitor — a capacitor that blocks the passage of direct current but allows alternating current to pass
- bloggs family, the — An imaginary family consisting of Fred and Mary Bloggs and their children. Used as a standard example in knowledge representation to show the difference between extensional and intensional objects. For example, every occurrence of "Fred Bloggs" is the same unique person, whereas occurrences of "person" may refer to different people. Members of the Bloggs family have been known to pop up in bizarre places such as the DEC Telephone Directory. Compare Mbogo, Dr. Fred.
- bloodbrain barrier — a layer of tightly packed cells that make up the walls of brain capillaries and prevent substances in the blood from diffusing freely into the brain: passage across the cell membranes is determined by solubility in the lipid bilayer or recognition by a transport molecule.
- blue-collar worker — a manual industrial worker
- blue-plate special — an inexpensive restaurant meal served at a fixed price on a large plate, originally blue
- board of elections — a bipartisan board appointed usually by local authorities and charged with control of elections and voting procedure.
- boltzmann constant — the ratio of the gas constant to the Avogadro constant, equal to 1.380 650 × 10–23 joule per kelvin
- bomb disposal unit — a unit of the police or armed services specializing in bomb disposal
- boole's inequality — the theorem that the probability of several events occurring is less than or equal to the sum of the probabilities of each event occurring.
- borosilicate glass — any of a range of heat- and chemical-resistant glasses, such as Pyrex, prepared by fusing together boron(III) oxide, silicon dioxide, and, usually, a metal oxide
- bottle-nosed whale — any of various beaked whales of the family Hyperoodontidae, characterized by a bulbous forehead, especially Hyperoodon ampullatus of the North Atlantic.
- branch to fishkill — (IBM: from the location of one of the corporation's facilities) Any unexpected jump in a program that produces catastrophic or just plain weird results. See jump off into never-never land, hyperspace.
- brazilian rosewood — a Brazilian tree, Dalbergia nigra, of the legume family.
- brazilian sapphire — a blue variety of tourmaline used as a gem: not a true sapphire.
- break your silence — If someone breaks their silence about something, they talk about something that they have not talked about before or for a long time.
- breast enlargement — a surgical procedure to increase the size of a woman's breasts
- breathe one's last — When someone breathes their last, they die.
- brewer's blackbird — a blackbird, Euphagus cyanocephalus, of the U.S., the male of which has greenish-black plumage with a purplish-black head.
- bring-and-buy sale — A bring-and-buy sale is an informal sale to raise money for a charity or other organization. People who come to the sale bring things to be sold and buy things that other people have brought.
- british somaliland — a former British protectorate (1884–1960) in E Africa, on the Gulf of Aden: united with Italian Somaliland in 1960 to form Somalia (or the Somali Republic); in 1991 the self-styled republic of Somaliland, covering the same area as the former British Somaliland, declared itself independent and continues to function largely as a separate entity, though without international recognition
- broad-leaved maple — a maple, Acer macrophyllum, of western North America, characterized by dark green, thickened leaves that may reach 12 inches (30 cm) or more in width.
- broken twill weave — a twill weave in which the direction of the diagonal produced by the weft threads is reversed after no more than two passages of the weft.
- bromochloromethane — chlorobromomethane.
- building materials — materials such as bricks, cement, timber, etc
- burkitt's lymphoma — a cancer characterized by tumors containing lymphoid cells, occurring esp. in children, in the jaw, eyes, and internal organs: it is associated with the Epstein-Barr virus
- butler's sideboard — a sideboard, often with a fall front, having on its top a china cabinet with glazed doors.
- butterhead lettuce — a major group of lettuce varieties having soft, pliable leaves and small, loose heads, including bibb and Boston lettuce
- california rosebay — a Pacific coast shrub or tree (Rhododendron californicum) of the heath family, with rosy or purplish flowers
- camel's-hair brush — an artist's small brush, made of hair from a squirrel's tail
- campbell-bannerman — Sir Henry. 1836–1908, British statesman and leader of the Liberal Party (1899–1908); prime minister (1905–08), who granted self-government to the Transvaal and the Orange River Colony
- cape breton island — an island off SE Canada, in NE Nova Scotia, separated from the mainland by the Strait of Canso: its easternmost point is Cape Breton. Pop: 132 298 (2006). Area: 10 280 sq km (3970 sq miles)
- carboxyhaemoglobin — haemoglobin coordinated with carbon monoxide, formed as a result of carbon monoxide poisoning. As carbon monoxide is bound in preference to oxygen, tissues are deprived of oxygen
- carisbrooke castle — a castle near Newport on the Isle of Wight: Charles I was held prisoner here from 1647 until his execution in 1649
- cas 8051 assembler — An experimental one-pass assembler for the 8051 with C-like syntax by Mark Hopkins. Most features of a modern assembler included except macros (soon to be added). Requires an ANSI-C compiler. Ported to MS-DOS, Ultrix, Sun-4. (July 1993). Version 1.2. Assembler/linker, disassembler, documentation, examples.
- cepheid (variable) — any of a class of pulsating, yellow, supergiant stars whose brightness varies in regular periods: from the period-luminosity relation, the distance of such a star can be determined
- cereal leaf beetle — an Old World leaf beetle, Oulema melanopus, introduced into North America in 1962: a serious pest of small grains, especially oats and cereal grasses.
- cerebral dominance — the normal tendency for one half of the brain, usually the left cerebral hemisphere in right-handed people, to exercise more control over certain functions (e.g. handedness and language) than the other
- chambered nautilus — nautilus (def 1).
- character-building — improving certain good or useful traits in a person's character, esp self-reliance, endurance, and courage
- cheval de bataille — a horse used in battle; charger.
- chlorobromomethane — a clear, colorless, volatile, nonflammable liquid, CH 2 ClBr, used chiefly as an extinguishing agent in fire extinguishers and as a solvent in organic synthesis.
- chlorofluorocarbon — Chlorofluorocarbons are the same as CFCs.