21-letter words containing a, l, s, o
- lafcadio's adventures — French Les Caves du Vatican. a novel (1914) by André Gide.
- language-based editor — language-sensitive editor
- lap and shoulder belt — a car seat belt
- laugh up one's sleeve — the part of a garment that covers the arm, varying in form and length but commonly tubular.
- law of thermodynamics — any of three principles variously stated in equivalent forms, being the principle that the change of energy of a thermodynamic system is equal to the heat transferred minus the work done (first law of thermodynamics) the principle that no cyclic process is possible in which heat is absorbed from a reservoir at a single temperature and converted completely into mechanical work (second law of thermodynamics) and the principle that it is impossible to reduce the temperature of a system to absolute zero in a finite number of operations (third law of thermodynamics)
- lay at someone's door — a movable, usually solid, barrier for opening and closing an entranceway, cupboard, cabinet, or the like, commonly turning on hinges or sliding in grooves.
- league of arab states — Arab League.
- leaning tower of pisa — a round, marble campanile in Pisa, Italy, begun in 1174 and now 17 feet (5.2 meters) out of the perpendicular in its height of 179 feet (54 meters).
- least common multiple — lowest common multiple.
- legionnaire's disease — a serious, sometimes fatal, infection, caused by the bacterium Legionella pneumophila, which has symptoms similar to those of pneumonia: believed to be spread by inhalation of contaminated water vapour from showers and air-conditioning plants
- legionnaires' disease — a type of acute pneumonia caused by Legionella pneumophila bacterium and characterized by fever, chest pain, cough, and muscle aches.
- lender of last resort — the central bank of a country with authority for controlling its banking system
- level of significance — significance level.
- lexical decision task — an experimental task in which subjects have to decide as fast as possible whether a given letter string is a word
- lie at someone's door — a movable, usually solid, barrier for opening and closing an entranceway, cupboard, cabinet, or the like, commonly turning on hinges or sliding in grooves.
- like a shag on a rock — abandoned and alone
- linear transformation — linear map
- locally compact space — a topological space in which each point has a neighborhood that is compact.
- logic design language — (language) A language for computer design.
- long-term liabilities — Long-term liabilities are debts that a company does not have to pay back for a year or more.
- look to one's laurels — any tree of the genus Laurus.
- lose one's heart (to) — to fall in love (with)
- lost-and-found column — a column in a newspaper that carries advertisements from people who have lost or found things
- lotus of the good law — Saddharma-Pundarika.
- lotus-of-the-true-law — a Mahayana sutra, forming with its references to Amida and the Bodhisattvas the basis for the doctrine that there is something of Buddha in everyone, so that salvation is universally available: a central text of Mahayana Buddhism.
- luck was on sb's side — If you say that luck was on someone's side, you mean that they succeeded in something by chance as well as by their own efforts or ability.
- macintosh common lisp — (language) (MCL) Common Lisp for the Apple Macintosh. Guillaume Cartier, of the Mathematics Department at UQAM, Canada, has written some libraries.
- macintosh file system — (file system) A file on the Macintosh consists of two parts, called forks. The "data fork" contains the data which would normally be stored in the file on other operating systems. The "resource fork" contains a collection of arbitrary attribute/value pairs, including program segments, icon bitmaps, and parametric values. Yet more information regarding Macintosh files is stored by the Finder in a hidden file, called the "Desktop Database". Because of the complications in storing different parts of a Macintosh file in non-Macintosh file systems that only handle consecutive data in one part, it is common to only send the Data fork or to convert the Macintosh file into some other format before transferring it.
- magnetofluid dynamics — magnetohydrodynamics.
- magnetoplasmadynamics — magnetohydrodynamics.
- maidenhair spleenwort — an evergreen fern, Asplenium trichomanes, abundant in woody areas of the North Temperate Zone, having thickly clustered fronds.
- main-topsail schooner — a two-masted or three-masted schooner having square topsails on the foremast and mainmast: a jackass brig or jackass bark.
- majority shareholding — a holding of more than half a company's shares
- make a pig of oneself — If you say that someone is making a pig of themselves, you are criticizing them for eating a very large amount at one meal.
- make one's blood boil — the fluid that circulates in the principal vascular system of human beings and other vertebrates, in humans consisting of plasma in which the red blood cells, white blood cells, and platelets are suspended.
- make up for lost time — compensate for past inaction
- make yourself at home — settle in
- management consultant — A management consultant is someone whose job is to advise companies on the most efficient ways to run their business.
- mask read-only memory — (storage) (MROM) A kind of ROM in which the memory contents are determined by one of the masks used to manufacture the integrated circuit. MROM can give high storage density (bits per millimeter squared) making it a cheap solution for high volume applications.
- mechanical solidarity — social cohesiveness that is based on shared activities, beliefs, and experiences and is characteristic of simple traditional societies.
- mechanical suspension — the act of suspending.
- medical social worker — a person who works in a hospital and is responsible for offering counselling to patients and their families and ensuring that discharged patients will receive appropriate care in the community
- medium access control — Media Access Control
- megaloblastic anaemia — any anaemia, esp pernicious anaemia, characterized by the presence of megaloblasts in the blood or bone marrow
- megaspore mother cell — a diploid cell in plants that undergoes meiosis to create four haploid megaspores.
- meter-kilogram-second — of or relating to the system of units in which the meter, kilogram, and second are the principal units of length, mass, and time. Abbreviation: mks, MKS.
- methylisothiazolinone — (chemistry) A powerful biocide and preservative within the group of isothiazolinones, used in shampoos etc.
- 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
- modulus of elasticity — the ratio of the stress applied to a body or substance to the resulting strain within the elastic limit
- mother-of-pearl glass — an American art glassware having colored glass set into indentations in a thickness of opaque glass, the whole covered with clear glass and etched slightly with acid.