0%

18-letter words containing a, b, s, o

  • bipolar transistor — (electronics)   A transistor made from a sandwich of n- and p-type semiconductor material: either npn or pnp. The middle section is known as the "base" and the other two as the "collector" and "emitter". When used as an amplifying element, the base to emitter junction is in a "forward-biased" (conducting) condition, and the base to collector junction is "reverse-biased" or non-conducting. Small changes in the base to emitter current (the input signal) cause either holes (for pnp devices) or free electrons (for npn) to enter the base from the emitter. The attracting voltage of the collector causes the majority of these charges to cross into and be collected by the collector, resulting in amplification. Contrast field effect transistor.
  • birds of a feather — If you refer to two people as birds of a feather, you mean that they have the same interests or are very similar.
  • biz-core stability — (security)   Internet security products which secure the business core.
  • black-necked stork — a large Australian stork, Xenorhyncus asiaticus, having a white plumage, dark green back and tail, and red legs
  • 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)
  • blissful ignorance — unawareness or inexperience of something unpleasant
  • 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.
  • board of directors — A company's board of directors is the group of people elected by its shareholders to manage the company.
  • board of elections — a bipartisan board appointed usually by local authorities and charged with control of elections and voting procedure.
  • board of examiners — a group of people who officially administer examinations
  • board of governors — a group of people who oversee the running of a school
  • 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.
  • bore the pants off — to bore extremely
  • 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
  • bosnia-herzegovina — a country in SE Europe; a constituent republic of Yugoslavia until 1991; in a state of civil war (1992–95); Serbian and Croatian forces were also involved: mostly barren and mountainous, with forests in the east. Languages: Bosnian, Croatian, and Serbian (formerly all regarded together as Serbo-Croat). Religion: Muslim, Serbian Orthodox, and Roman Catholic. Currency: marka (pegged to the euro). Capital: Sarajevo. Pop: 3 875 723 (2013 est). Area: 51 129 sq km (19 737 sq miles)
  • boston baked beans — haricot beans baked with belly pork and molasses
  • boston brown bread — a dark, sweetened, steamed bread made of cornmeal, rye or wheat flour, etc., and molasses
  • bottle-nosed whale — any of various beaked whales of the family Hyperoodontidae, characterized by a bulbous forehead, especially Hyperoodon ampullatus of the North Atlantic.
  • bounty-fed farmers — farmers who benefit from subsidies
  • branch instruction — a machine-language or assembly-language instruction that causes the computer to branch to another instruction
  • 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.
  • breach of security — an act that violates a country, area, or building's security measures
  • 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.
  • breathe one's last — When someone breathes their last, they die.
  • 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
  • broadcasting house — any of a number of buildings in the UK from which the BBC broadcasts or has broadcast
  • bronchocandidiasis — See under candidiasis.
  • brothers karamazov — a novel (1880) by Dostoevsky.
  • 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
  • bursa of fabricius — a lymphoid gland of the cloaca in birds, believed to function in disease resistance, and closing or disappearing as the bird ages.
  • business education — education for general knowledge of business practices.
  • butler's sideboard — a sideboard, often with a fall front, having on its top a china cabinet with glazed doors.
  • cabernet sauvignon — a black grape originally grown in the Bordeaux area of France, and now throughout the wine-producing world
  • california rosebay — a Pacific coast shrub or tree (Rhododendron californicum) of the heath family, with rosy or purplish flowers
  • cambrian mountains — a mountain range in Wales, extending from Carmarthenshire in the S to Denbighshire in the N. Highest peak: Aran Fawddwy, 891 m (2970 ft)
  • 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)
  • carbonic anhydrase — an enzyme in blood cells that catalyses the decomposition of carbonic acid into carbon dioxide and water, facilitating the transport of carbon dioxide from the tissues to the lungs
  • carisbrooke castle — a castle near Newport on the Isle of Wight: Charles I was held prisoner here from 1647 until his execution in 1649
  • catch one's breath — When you catch your breath while you are doing something energetic, you stop for a short time so that you can start breathing normally again.
  • chamber of horrors — a room, for example in a waxworks, containing objects, images or representations of people or scenes that are believed likely to frighten or horrify visitors
  • chebyshev equation — Tchebycheff equation.
  • christian brothers — a religious congregation of laymen founded in France in 1684 for the education of the poor
  • claustrophobically — In a claustrophobic way.
  • coffee-table music — unadventurous music
  • combination square — an adjustable device for carpenters, used as a try square, miter square, level, etc.
  • combustion chamber — an enclosed space in which combustion takes place, such as the space above the piston in the cylinder head of an internal-combustion engine or the chambers in a gas turbine or rocket engine in which fuel and oxidant burn
  • combustion furnace — a furnace used in the laboratory to carry out elemental analysis of organic compounds
Was this page helpful?
Yes No
Thank you for your feedback! Tell your friends about this page
Tell us why?