0%

17-letter words containing a, l, c, m, o

  • foucault pendulum — a pendulum that demonstrates the rotation of the earth by exhibiting an apparent change in its plane of oscillation.
  • fractal dimension — (mathematics)   A common type of fractal dimension is the Hausdorff-Besicovich Dimension, but there are several different ways of computing fractal dimension. Fractal dimension can be calculated by taking the limit of the quotient of the log change in object size and the log change in measurement scale, as the measurement scale approaches zero. The differences come in what is exactly meant by "object size" and what is meant by "measurement scale" and how to get an average number out of many different parts of a geometrical object. Fractal dimensions quantify the static *geometry* of an object. For example, consider a straight line. Now blow up the line by a factor of two. The line is now twice as long as before. Log 2 / Log 2 = 1, corresponding to dimension 1. Consider a square. Now blow up the square by a factor of two. The square is now 4 times as large as before (i.e. 4 original squares can be placed on the original square). Log 4 / log 2 = 2, corresponding to dimension 2 for the square. Consider a snowflake curve formed by repeatedly replacing ___ with _/\_, where each of the 4 new lines is 1/3 the length of the old line. Blowing up the snowflake curve by a factor of 3 results in a snowflake curve 4 times as large (one of the old snowflake curves can be placed on each of the 4 segments _/\_). Log 4 / log 3 = 1.261... Since the dimension 1.261 is larger than the dimension 1 of the lines making up the curve, the snowflake curve is a fractal. [sci.fractals FAQ].
  • french somaliland — a former name of Djibouti (def 1).
  • functional isomer — any of several structural isomers that have the same molecular formula but with the atoms connected in different ways and therefore falling into different functional groups.
  • garlic mayonnaise — mayonnaise flavoured with garlic
  • genetic algorithm — (GA) An evolutionary algorithm which generates each individual from some encoded form known as a "chromosome" or "genome". Chromosomes are combined or mutated to breed new individuals. "Crossover", the kind of recombination of chromosomes found in sexual reproduction in nature, is often also used in GAs. Here, an offspring's chromosome is created by joining segments choosen alternately from each of two parents' chromosomes which are of fixed length. GAs are useful for multidimensional optimisation problems in which the chromosome can encode the values for the different variables being optimised.
  • geographical mile — nautical mile.
  • glove compartment — a compartment in the dashboard of an automobile for storing small items.
  • glycosaminoglycan — any of a class of polysaccharides derived from hexosamine that form mucins when complexed with proteins: formerly called mucopolysaccharide.
  • good-time charlie — an affable, sociable, pleasure-loving man.
  • grandmother clock — a pendulum clock similar to a grandfather's clock but shorter.
  • guglielmo marconi — Guglielmo [goo-lyel-maw] /guˈlyɛl mɔ/ (Show IPA), Marchese, 1874–1937, Italian electrical engineer and inventor, especially in the field of wireless telegraphy: Nobel Prize in physics 1909.
  • gunboat diplomacy — diplomatic relations involving the use or threat of military force, especially by a powerful nation against a weaker one.
  • haematocrystallin — Alternative form of hematocrystallin.
  • hamiltonian cycle — Hamiltonian problem
  • harmonic analysis — the calculation of Fourier series and their generalization.
  • harmonic interval — an intervening period of time: an interval of 50 years.
  • heterochlamydeous — (of a plant) having a perianth consisting of distinct sepals and petals
  • hippocampal gyrus — a convolution on the inner surface of the temporal lobe of the cerebrum, bordering the hippocampus.
  • histamine blocker — any of various substances that act at a specific receptor site to block certain actions of histamine.
  • historical method — the process of establishing general facts and principles through attention to chronology and to the evolution or historical course of what is being studied.
  • ho chi minh trail — a network of jungle paths winding from North Vietnam through Laos and Cambodia into South Vietnam, used as a military route by North Vietnam to supply the Vietcong during the Vietnam War.
  • homeland security — national defence
  • homovanillic acid — the end product of dopamine metabolism, C 9 H 10 O 4 , found in human urine.
  • hypocholesteremia — an abnormally low amount of cholesterol in the blood.
  • ice-cream parlour — a place where people go to eat ice cream
  • ideogrammatically — In terms of, or by means of, ideograms.
  • income inequality — a situation in which there is great disparity in income within a society
  • incommunicability — incapable of being communicated, imparted, shared, etc.
  • incompatibilities — not compatible; unable to exist together in harmony: She asked for a divorce because they were utterly incompatible.
  • intercolumniation — the space between two adjacent columns, usually the clear space between the lower parts of the shafts.
  • intersectionalism — The study of minorities within minorities, or intersections between minorities; specifically, the study of the interactions of multiple systems of oppression or discrimination.
  • isomorphism class — (mathematics)   A collection of all the objects isomorphic to a given object. Talking about the isomorphism class (of a poset, say) ensures that we will only consider its properties as a poset, and will not consider other incidental properties it happens to have.
  • joachim du bellay — Joachim [French zhaw-a-keem] /French ʒɔ aˈkim/ (Show IPA), Bellay, Joachim du.
  • jumping-off place — a place for use as a starting point: Paris was the jumping-off place for our tour of Europe.
  • kvatro telecom as — (company)   The company that maintains Mary. Address: Trondheim, Norway.
  • lame-duck session — (formerly) the December to March session of those members of the U.S. Congress who were defeated for reelection the previous November.
  • landlocked salmon — a variety of the Atlantic Ocean salmon, Salmo salar, confined to the freshwater lakes of New England and adjacent areas of Canada.
  • laplace transform — a map of a function, as a signal, defined especially for positive real values, as time greater than zero, into another domain where the function is represented as a sum of exponentials.
  • larmor precession — the precession of charged particles, as electrons, placed in a magnetic field, the frequency of the precession (Larmor frequency) being equal to the electronic charge times the strength of the magnetic field divided by 4π times the mass.
  • law of trichotomy — the property that for natural numbers a and b , either a is less than b , a equals b , or a is greater than b .
  • level compensator — an automatic gain control device used in the receivers of telegraphic circuits.
  • liberal democracy — a democracy based on the recognition of individual rights and freedoms, in which decisions from direct or representative processes prevail in many policy areas
  • liberal democrats — (in Britain) a political party with centrist policies; established in 1988 as the Social and Liberal Democrats when the Liberal Party merged with the Social Democratic Party; renamed Liberal Democrats in 1989
  • line of scrimmage — an imaginary line parallel to the goal lines that passes from one sideline to the other through the point of the football closest to the goal line of each team.
  • lithium carbonate — a colorless crystalline compound, Li 2 CO 3 , slightly soluble in water: used in ceramic and porcelain glazes, pharmaceuticals, and luminescent paints.
  • load displacement — the weight, in long tons, of a cargo vessel loaded so that the summer load line touches the surface of the water.
  • local examination — any of various examinations, such as the GCSE, set by university boards and conducted in local centres, schools, etc
  • loco primo citato — loc. primo cit.
  • logic programming — (artificial intelligence, programming, language)   A declarative, relational style of programming based on first-order logic. The original logic programming language was Prolog. The concept is based on Horn clauses. The programmer writes a "database" of "facts", e.g. wet(water). ("water is wet") and "rules", e.g. mortal(X) :- human(X). ("X is mortal is implied by X is human"). Facts and rules are collectively known as "clauses". The user supplies a "goal" which the system attempts to prove using "resolution" or "backward chaining". This involves matching the current goal against each fact or the left hand side of each rule using "unification". If the goal matches a fact, the goal succeeds; if it matches a rule then the process recurses, taking each sub-goal on the right hand side of the rule as the current goal. If all sub-goals succeed then the rule succeeds. Each time a possible clause is chosen, a "choice point" is created on a stack. If subsequent resolution fails then control eventually returns to the choice point and subsequent clauses are tried. This is known as "backtracking". Clauses may contain logic variables which take on any value necessary to make the fact or the left hand side of the rule match a goal. Unification binds these variables to the corresponding subterms of the goal. Such bindings are associated with the choice point at which the clause was chosen and are undone when backtracking reaches that choice point. The user is informed of the success or failure of his first goal and if it succeeds and contains variables he is told what values of those variables caused it to succeed. He can then ask for alternative solutions.
Was this page helpful?
Yes No
Thank you for your feedback! Tell your friends about this page
Tell us why?