21-letter words containing a, d, i, c, t, e
- metropolitan district — any of the districts making up the metropolitan counties of England: since 1986 they have functioned as unitary authorities, forming the sole principal tier of local government. Each metropolitan district has an elected council responsible for education, social services, etc
- modern apprenticeship — an arrangement that allows a school leaver to gain vocational qualifications while being trained in a job
- modulus of elasticity — the ratio of the stress applied to a body or substance to the resulting strain within the elastic limit
- monochloroacetic acid — chloroacetic acid.
- muon-catalysed fusion — an experimental form of nuclear fusion in which hydrogen and deuterium muonic atoms are formed. Because the mass of the muon is much larger than that of the electron, the atoms are smaller, and the nuclei are close enough for fusion to occur
- near-death experience — A near-death experience is a strange experience that some people who have nearly died say they had when they were unconscious.
- non-repeating decimal — a decimal representation of any irrational number, having the property that no sequence of digits is repeated ad infinitum.
- noncustodial sentence — a punishment given by a court of law that does not involve a prison term, such as a fine or a restriction order
- occupational guidance — advice and guidance relating to employment issues and career choices
- old spanish practices — irregular practices among a group of workers to gain increased financial allowances, reduced working hours, etc
- open trading protocol — Internet Open Trading Protocol
- optical double (star) — double star (sense 2)
- pacific daylight time — the version of Pacific Standard Time that is in use when daylight saving time is being observed
- pacific standard time — See under standard time.
- painter and decorator — a person who paints and decorates houses as a trade
- paradoxical intention — (in psychotherapy) the deliberate practice of a neurotic habit or thought, undertaken in order to remove it
- pathfinder prospectus — a prospectus regarding the flotation of a new company that contains only sufficient details to test the market reaction
- performance indicator — a quantitative or qualitative measurement, or any other criterion, by which the performance, efficiency, achievement, etc of a person or organization can be assessed, often by comparison with an agreed standard or target
- pipelined burst cache — Pipeline Burst Cache
- play with a full deck — Nautical. a floorlike surface wholly or partially occupying one level of a hull, superstructure, or deckhouse, generally cambered, and often serving as a member for strengthening the structure of a vessel. the space between such a surface and the next such surface above: Our stateroom was on B deck.
- politically motivated — If an act of violence is politically motivated, it is carried out in the interests of a particular government or political party.
- pomp and circumstance — ceremony
- printed circuit board — a circuit in which the interconnecting conductors and some of the circuit components have been printed, etched, etc., onto a sheet or board of dielectric material (PC board, printed-circuit board)
- production department — the department of a business or organization responsible for manufacturing products
- progressive education — any of various reformist educational philosophies and methodologies since the late 1800s, applied especially to elementary schools, that reject the rote recitation and strict discipline of traditional, single-classroom teaching, favoring instead more stimulation of the individual pupil as well as group discussion, more informality in the classroom, a broader curriculum, and use of laboratories, gymnasiums, kitchens, etc., in the school.
- psychopathic disorder — (in England, according to the Mental Health Act 1983) a persistent disorder or disability of mind which results in abnormally aggressive or seriously irresponsible conduct on the part of the person concerned
- public address system — loudspeaker
- public-address system — a combination of electronic devices that makes sound audible via loudspeakers to many people, as in an auditorium or out of doors.
- pulse code modulation — a form of modulation that transforms a wave-form, as an audio signal, into a binary signal in which information is conveyed by a coded order of pulses for transmission, storage on a disk, or processing by a computer. Abbreviation: PCM.
- pulse-code modulation — a form of modulation that transforms a wave-form, as an audio signal, into a binary signal in which information is conveyed by a coded order of pulses for transmission, storage on a disk, or processing by a computer. Abbreviation: PCM.
- purchasing department — the group of staff within an organization that is responsible for buying goods or products
- record of achievement — a statement of the personal and educational development of each pupil
- reduced circumstances — If you say that someone is living in reduced circumstances, you mean that they do not have as much money as they used to have.
- registration document — a document giving identification details of a motor vehicle, including its manufacturer, date of registration, engine and chassis numbers, and owner's name
- retarded acceleration — velocity increase constrained by opposing forces such as wind resistance or braking
- ring down the curtain — to lower the curtain at the end of a theatrical performance
- road traffic accident — an accident involving vehicles
- royal victorian order — (in Britain) an order of chivalry founded by Queen Victoria in 1896, membership of which is conferred for special services to the sovereign
- rutherford scattering — the scattering of an alpha particle through a large angle with respect to the original direction of motion of the particle, caused by an atom (Rutherford atom) with most of the mass and all of the positive electric charge concentrated at a center or nucleus.
- s-k reduction machine — An abstract machine defined by Professor David Turner to evaluate combinator expressions represented as binary graphs. Named after the two basic combinators, S and K.
- sao tome and principe — Democratic Republic of, a republic in W Africa, comprising the islands of São Tomé and Príncipe, in the Gulf of Guinea, N of the equator: a former overseas province of Portugal; gained independence in 1975. 372 sq. mi. (964 sq. km). Capital: São Tomé.
- scalar triple product — the volume of the parallelepiped defined by three given vectors, u, v, and w, usually represented as u·v 1 (v×w), [ uvw ], or (uvw), where × denotes a cross product and · denotes an inner product.
- schema definition set — (SDS) Something in Portable Common Tool Environment.
- scorched earth policy — a military practice of devastating the property and agriculture of an area before abandoning it to an advancing enemy.
- scorched-earth policy — a military practice of devastating the property and agriculture of an area before abandoning it to an advancing enemy.
- seating accommodation — the provision of seats for people in a room, building, etc
- secondary containment — Secondary containment is a system for dealing with hazardous spills.
- sedimentary sequences — Sedimentary sequences are layers of rock which are derived from weathered rocks, biogenic (= of living organisms) activity, or precipitation from solution.
- semantic differential — a technique for measuring the connotative meaning of concepts by having an individual rate each concept on a series of graduated scales, each scale defined by a pair of polar adjectives, as good–bad or strong–weak.
- sheppard's correction — a method of correcting the bias in standard deviations and higher moments of distributions that arises from grouping values of the variable.