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20-letter words containing a, c, t, g

  • officer of the guard — an officer, acting under the officer of the day, who is responsible for the instruction, discipline, and performance of duty of the guard in a post, camp, or station. Abbreviation: OG, O.G.
  • omega-3 (fatty acid) — a type of polyunsaturated fatty acid in fish oil, shellfish, soybeans, etc., linked to low cholesterol and low LDL levels
  • omega-minus particle — a baryon with strangeness −3, isotopic spin 0, and negative charge; predicted from the mathematics of the Eightfold Way and subsequently discovered. Symbol: Ω −.
  • ontological argument — an a priori argument for the existence of God, asserting that as existence is a perfection, and as God is conceived of as the most perfect being, it follows that God must exist; originated by Anselm, later used by Duns Scotus, Descartes, and Leibniz.
  • open learning centre — an establishment which provides further education on a flexible part-time basis
  • operant conditioning — conditioning (def 1).
  • operating conditions — Operating conditions are a set of conditions for operating a particular system or process.
  • optical mark reading — the reading of marks by an optical device whereby the information can be stored in machine-readable form
  • orthognathic surgery — the surgical correction of deformities or malpositions of the jaw.
  • oscillating universe — a variant model of the closed universe in which the universe undergoes cycles of expansion and contraction.
  • ovo-lacto vegetarian — a vegetarian who eats eggs and dairy products
  • ovo-lacto-vegetarian — lacto-ovo-vegetarian.
  • oxyacetylene welding — welding using an oxyacetylene burner
  • paper chromatography — the separation of mixtures into their constituents by preferential adsorption by a solid, as a column of silica (column chromatography) or a strip of filter paper (paper chromatography) or by a gel.
  • peremptory challenge — a formal objection to the service of a juror by a party to a criminal prosecution or a civil action that requires no showing of cause.
  • perpendicular gothic — the style of Gothic architecture in England during the 14th and 15th centuries, characterized by tracery having vertical lines, a four-centred arch, and fan vaulting
  • photogelatin process — collotype (def 1).
  • phthalocyanine green — a pigment used in painting, derived from chlorinated copper phthalocyanine and characterized chiefly by its intense green color and permanence.
  • physical meteorology — the branch of meteorology dealing with the study of optical, electrical, acoustical, and thermodynamic phenomena in the atmosphere, including the physics of clouds and precipitation.
  • piezomagnetic effect — the production of a magnetic field by applying a mechanical stress to certain crystals
  • planning application — In Britain, a planning application is a formal request to a local authority for permission to build something new or to add something to an existing building.
  • pound cost averaging — a method of accumulating capital by investing a fixed sum in a particular security at regular intervals, in order to achieve an average purchase price below the arithmetic average of the market prices on the purchase dates
  • prescription glasses — corrective spectacles
  • prescriptive grammar — an approach to grammar that is concerned with establishing norms of correct and incorrect usage and formulating rules based on these norms to be followed by users of the language.
  • price-earnings ratio — the current price of a share of common stock divided by earnings per share over a 12-month period, often used in stock evaluation. Abbreviation: p/e.
  • procedural agreement — regulations agreed between the parties to collective bargaining, defining the bargaining units, bargaining scope, procedures for collective bargaining, and the facilities to be provided to trade union representatives
  • production agreement — a contract concerning the production or manufacture of something
  • proportional spacing — a feature of some typewriters and other output devices whereby the space allotted to each character is determined by the width of the character
  • prosecuting attorney — the public officer in a county, district, or other jurisdiction charged with carrying on the prosecution in criminal proceedings.
  • psychological moment — the proper or critical time for achieving a desired result: She found the right psychological moment to make her request.
  • quantum bogodynamics — /kwon'tm boh"goh-di:-nam"iks/ A theory that characterises the universe in terms of bogon sources (such as politicians, used-car salesmen, TV evangelists, and suits in general), bogon sinks (such as taxpayers and computers), and bogosity potential fields. Bogon absorption causes human beings to behave mindlessly and machines to fail (and may also cause both to emit secondary bogons); however, the precise mechanics of bogon-computron interaction are not yet understood. Quantum bogodynamics is most often invoked to explain the sharp increase in hardware and software failures in the presence of suits; the latter emit bogons, which the former absorb.
  • quantum cryptography — a method of coding information based on quantum mechanics, which is said to be unbreakable
  • quarantine anchorage — an anchorage for ships awaiting a pratique.
  • real-time processing — data-processing by a computer which receives constantly changing data, such as information relating to air-traffic control, travel booking systems, etc, and processes it sufficiently rapidly to be able to control the source of the data
  • reciprocating engine — an engine in which one or more pistons move backwards and forwards inside a cylinder or cylinders
  • redundancy agreement — an agreement over the sum of money given by an employer to an employee who has been made redundant
  • refracting telescope — an optical instrument for making distant objects appear larger and therefore nearer. One of the two principal forms (refracting telescope) consists essentially of an objective lens set into one end of a tube and an adjustable eyepiece or combination of lenses set into the other end of a tube that slides into the first and through which the enlarged object is viewed directly; the other form (reflecting telescope) has a concave mirror that gathers light from the object and focuses it into an adjustable eyepiece or combination of lenses through which the reflection of the object is enlarged and viewed. Compare radio telescope.
  • regenerative cooling — Physics. a method of cooling a gas, utilizing the rapid expansion of a compressed portion of the gas, before it becomes liquid, to cool the remainder.
  • regenerative furnace — a furnace in which the incoming air is heated by regenerators.
  • repurchase agreement — a contract between a dealer, as a bank, and an investor, whereby the investor purchases securities with the promise that they will be bought back by the dealer on a designated date, for which the investor receives a fixed return.
  • restriction fragment — a length of DNA cut from the strand by a restriction enzyme.
  • ring-necked parakeet — a small brightly coloured long-tailed tropical parrot, Psittacula krameri, often kept as a pet
  • ring-necked pheasant — a gallinaceous Asian bird, Phasianus colchicus, having a white band around its neck, introduced into Great Britain, North America, and the Hawaiian Islands.
  • rotary-wing aircraft — an aircraft, esp a helicopter, that is lifted or propelled by rotating airfoils
  • saint george's cross — the Greek cross as used in the flag of Great Britain.
  • sarcastic fringehead — any fish of the genus Neoclinus, characterized by a row of fleshy processes on the head, as N. blanchardi (sarcastic fringehead) of California coastal waters.
  • scatter site housing — public housing, especially for low-income families, built throughout an urban area rather than being concentrated in a single neighborhood.
  • scavenger's daughter — an instrument of torture that doubled over and squeezed the body so strongly and violently that blood was brought forth from the ears and nose: invented in 16th-century England.
  • schrodinger equation — the wave equation of nonrelativistic quantum mechanics. Also called Schrödinger wave equation. Compare wave equation (def 2).
  • semiautobiographical — pertaining to or being a fictionalized account of an author's own life.
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