20-letter words containing a, d, e
- antonello da messina — ?1430–?79, Italian painter, born in Sicily. His paintings include St Jerome in His Study and Portrait of a Man
- antony and cleopatra — a tragedy (1606–07?) by Shakespeare.
- apollonius of rhodes — 3rd century bc, Greek epic poet and head of the Library of Alexandria. His principal work is the four-volume Argonautica
- appalachian dulcimer — dulcimer (def 2).
- apparent candlepower — a measure of the luminous intensity of an extended source of light in terms of the candlepower of a point source of light that has an equivalent luminous intensity when placed at the same distance as the extended source.
- aquila degli abruzzi — a city in central Italy, capital of Abruzzi region. Pop: 68 503 (2001)
- argument from design — the argument for the existence of God based on the assumption that order in the universe implies an orderer and cannot be a natural feature of the universe.
- arrested development — physical development that is not complete
- as straight as a die — perfectly honest
- aschheim-zondek test — a test used to detect whether a woman is pregnant by noting the effect on the ovaries of an immature mouse or rabbit injected with her urine.
- asexual reproduction — reproduction, as budding, fission, or spore formation, not involving the union of gametes.
- assessment procedure — an established method of assessing students or workers
- associated statehood — the semi-independent political status of various former British colonies in the Caribbean from 1967 until each became an independent state in the British Commonwealth, by which Britain retained responsibility for defence and some aspects of foreign affairs. The associated states were Anguilla, Antigua, Dominica, Grenada, St Kitts-Nevis, St Lucia, and St Vincent and the Grenadines
- at the crack of dawn — If you say that someone does something at the crack of dawn, you are emphasizing that they do it very early in the morning.
- at the drop of a hat — If you say that you are ready to do something at the drop of a hat, you mean that you are willing to do it immediately, without hesitating.
- attendance allowance — (in Britain) a tax-free noncontributory welfare benefit for people over 65 years old who are so severely disabled that they need frequent attention or continual supervision for a period of six months or more
- audio-lingual method — a technique of foreign-language instruction that emphasizes audio-lingual skills over reading and writing and is characterized by extensive use of pattern practice.
- backwards compatible — backward compatibility
- balanced three-phase — A balanced three-phase voltage or current is one in which the size of each phase is the same, and the phase angles of the three phases differ from each other by 120 degrees.
- balled-and-burlapped — of or relating to a tree, shrub, or other plant prepared for transplanting by allowing the roots to remain covered by a ball of soil around which canvas or burlap is tied.
- ballet-wrap cardigan — a cardigan with wrapover fronts which are fastened with wraparound ties
- baptism for the dead — the baptism of a living person in the place of and for the sake of one who has died unbaptized: now practiced chiefly by Mormons.
- barking and dagenham — a borough of E Greater London. Pop: 165 900 (2003 est). Area: 34 sq km (13 sq miles)
- barred spiral galaxy — a spiral galaxy whose center has the form of an extended bar.
- bartramian sandpiper — upland sandpiper.
- basic encoding rules — (protocol, standard) (BER) ASN.1 encoding rules for producing self-identifying and self-delimiting transfer syntax for data structures described in ASN.1 notations. BER is an self-identifying and self-delimiting encoding scheme, which means that each data value can be identified, extracted and decoded individually. Huw Rogers once described BER as "a triumph of bloated theory over clean implementation". He also criticises it as designed around bitstreams with arbitrary boundaries between data which can only be determined at a high level. Documents: ITU-T X.690, ISO 8825-1. See also CER, DER, PER.
- basic lead carbonate — ceruse.
- basic object adapter — (architecture) (BOA) Part of the CORBA architecture.
- be called to the bar — to become a barrister
- be hard pushed to do — If you are hard pushed to do something, you find it very difficult to do it.
- be-twixt and between — betwixt and between, neither the one nor the other; in a middle or unresolved position: Not wanting to side with either her father or her mother, she was betwixt and between.
- beat around the bush — to talk around a subject without getting to the point
- beaverhead mountains — a mountain range on the border of E Idaho and SW Montana, in the Bitterroot Range. 10,961 feet (3343 meters).
- been-there done-that — an exclamation expressing familiarity and boredom with a situation, experience, etc
- belgian shepherd dog — a medium-sized well-proportioned dog of a breed that resembles an Alsatian in appearance and is often used as a sheepdog or a guard dog
- benoit b. mandelbrot — Benoit Mandelbrot
- benzene hexachloride — a compound, C6H6Cl6, used as an insecticide
- benzenesulfonic acid — a fine, needlelike substance, C 6 H 6 SO 3 , used chiefly as a catalyst and in the synthesis of phenol, resorcinol, and other organic products.
- bernard of clairvaux — Saint. ?1090–1153, French abbot and theologian, who founded the stricter branch of the Cistercians in 1115
- bernese mountain dog — a strong sturdy dog of a breed with a bushy tail and a long silky black coat with reddish-brown and white markings, often used as a working farm dog
- binary coded decimal — (data) (BCD, packed decimal) A number representation where a number is expressed as a sequence of decimal digits and then each decimal digit is encoded as a four-bit binary number (a nibble). E.g. decimal 92 would be encoded as the eight-bit sequence 1001 0010. In some cases, the right-most nibble contains the sign (positive or negative). It is easier to convert decimal numbers to and from BCD than binary and, though BCD is often converted to binary for arithmetic processing, it is possible to build hardware that operates directly on BCD.
- binary-coded decimal — a number in binary code written in groups of four bits, each group representing one digit of the corresponding decimal number
- biological diversity — Biological diversity is the same as biodiversity.
- bird-footed dinosaur — theropod.
- black lung (disease) — a disease of the lungs caused by the inhalation of coal dust; anthracosis
- black-bellied plover — a large plover, Pluvialis squatarola, of both the New and Old Worlds, having black underparts when in nuptial plumage.
- black-throated diver — a diving bird, Gavia arctica, found in Europe and Asia, and a rare summer visitor to the UK
- blending inheritance — the blending of characteristics of the parents in the offspring, as in a pink flower that results from the mating of a red flower with a white one
- blood on one's hands — If you say that someone has a person's blood on their hands, you mean that they are responsible for that person's death.
- blue ridge mountains — a mountain range in the eastern US, extending from West Virginia into Georgia: part of the Appalachian mountains. Highest peak: Mount Mitchell, 2038 m (6684 ft)