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20-letter words containing a, p, r, i, o

  • primary spermatocyte — a male germ cell (primary spermatocyte) that gives rise by meiosis to a pair of haploid cells (secondary spermatocytes) that give rise in turn to spermatids.
  • primitive polynomial — a polynomial that has content equal to 1. Compare content1 (def 11a).
  • prince william sound — a sound in the Gulf of Alaska, on the S coast of Alaska: S end of Trans-Alaska oil pipeline at port of Valdez.
  • priority inheritance — (parallel)   A technique for avoiding priority inversion by temporarily raising the prioriry of all processes that want to access a shared resource to the highest priority level of any of them. Priority inversion occurs where a low priority process, L is holding a resource required by a high priority process, H, but L is not running because a medium priority process, M is running. Under priority inheritance, L temporarily inherits H's priority, allowing L to run and release the resource H is waiting for. For example, an ambulance (H) is stuck behind a lorry (L) waiting at a junction (the shared resource) for a gap in a line of cars (M) using the junction. Applying priority inheritance, the cars give way to the lorry as they would to the ambulance, thus allowing the lorry and then the ambulance to use the junction.
  • private investigator — private detective. Abbreviation: PI, p.i., P.I.
  • proactive inhibition — the tendency for earlier memories to interfere with the retrieval of material learned later
  • probability function — the function the values of which are probabilities of the distinct outcomes of a discrete random variable
  • production agreement — a contract concerning the production or manufacture of something
  • programming language — a high-level language used to write computer programs, as COBOL or BASIC, or, sometimes, an assembly language.
  • prohibited substance — a substance, such as a drug, etc, that is banned or forbidden by law or other authority
  • property speculation — the buying or selling of property in the hope of deriving capital gains
  • proportional counter — a radiation counter in which the strength of each electric pulse generated per count is proportional to the energy of the particle or photon producing the pulse, alpha particles producing a different electric pulse from beta rays.
  • 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
  • proprietary medicine — a drug or agent manufactured and distributed under a trade name
  • prosecuting attorney — the public officer in a county, district, or other jurisdiction charged with carrying on the prosecution in criminal proceedings.
  • psychiatric hospital — institution treating mental disorders
  • public administrator — an official of a city, county, or state government.
  • pyroligneous alcohol — methyl alcohol.
  • queen of the prairie — a tall plant, Filipendula rubra, of the rose family, having branching clusters of pink flowers, growing in meadows and prairies.
  • rapid reaction force — a force that can be deployed swiftly to a site of conflict or potential conflict
  • read-eval-print loop — (language, LISP, programming)   (REPL) A programming structure within LISP which repeatedly reads a form from the user, evaluates it, and displays the result. A read-eval-print loop forms the basis of the Top-Level shell that programmers of the LISP family of languages interact with. In many dialects of LISP a very simple REPL could be implemented as: (loop (print (eval (read)))). (2003-06-23)
  • 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
  • reciprocal insurance — insurance in which members of a reciprocal exchange, acting through an attorney-in-fact, insure themselves and each other.
  • reciprocating engine — an engine in which one or more pistons move backwards and forwards inside a cylinder or cylinders
  • recreational therapy — therapy by means of recreational activities engaged in by the patient
  • 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.
  • refuse disposal unit — a unit or part of a sink that disposes of waste food, etc, by grinding
  • regional development — aid-giving to poorer areas or countries
  • relative deprivation — the perception of an unfair disparity between one's situation and that of others.
  • relative probability — a measure or estimate of the degree of confidence one may have in the occurrence of an event, defined as the limit of the proportion observed in a sample as the sample size tends to infinity
  • republic of maldives — a republic occupying an archipelago of 1087 coral islands in the Indian Ocean, southwest of Sri Lanka: came under British protection in 1887; became independent in 1965 and a republic in 1968; member of the Commonwealth (1982–2016). The economy and infrastructure were severely damaged in the Indian Ocean tsunami of December 2004. Official language: Divehi. Official religion: (Sunni) Muslim. Currency: rufiyaa. Capital: Malé. Pop: 393 988 (2013 est). Area: 298 sq km (115 sq miles)
  • réseaux ip européens — (RIPE) A collaboration between European networks which use the TCP/IP protocol suite to provide Internet services.
  • respiratory quotient — the ratio of the amount of carbon dioxide released by the lungs to the amount of oxygen taken in during a given period.
  • retinitis pigmentosa — degeneration of the retina manifested by night blindness and gradual loss of peripheral vision, eventually resulting in tunnel vision or total blindness.
  • rocky mountain sheep — bighorn.
  • rotations per minute — revolutions per minute
  • royal leamington spa — a city in Warwickshire, central England: health resort.
  • sailor's breastplate — a knot consisting of three overlapping loops formed by a single rope passed alternately over and under itself at crossings.
  • santa cruz operation — (SCO) A supplier of Unix systems for Intel microprocessors. They supply Xenix and Open Desktop. Founded in 1979, SCO became a public company in May, 1993 and trades on the Nasdaq National Market System under the symbol SCOC. SCO maintains its world headquarters in Santa Cruz, California, USA; a European headquarters in Watford, England; a Government Systems Group in Reston, Virginia; and offices in Asia, Australia, Canada, Latin America, and throughout Europe and the United States. In February 1993, SCO acquired IXI Limited of Cambridge, England, the leading supplier of Unix System windowing software.
  • satellite photograph — a photograph taken by an artificial satellite from space
  • schizoid personality — sb with identity disorder
  • semiautobiographical — pertaining to or being a fictionalized account of an author's own life.
  • separation allowance — an allowance paid to a member of the military when they are forced to be apart from their family due to their military duties
  • separation of powers — the principle or system of vesting in separate branches the executive, legislative, and judicial powers of a government.
  • serve a person right — to pay a person back, esp for wrongful or foolish treatment or behaviour
  • service access point — (networking)   (SAP) The OSI term for the component of a network address which identifies the individual application on a host which is sending or receiving a packet. Different SAPs distinguish between different services or applications on a host, e.g. electronic mail, FTP, HTTP.
  • sex change operation — a surgical operation designed to change a person's physical sexual characteristics to those of the opposite sex
  • sharp-tailed sparrow — a sparrow, Ammospiza caudacuta, inhabiting salt marshes in North America, having narrow, sharply pointed tail feathers.
  • south american plate — a major tectonic division of the earth's crust, comprising the continent of South America and several ocean basins and bounded on the north by the Caribbean Plate, on the east by the Mid-Atlantic Ridge, on the west by a submarine trench that borders the western coast of the continent, and on the south by the Antarctic Plate.
  • span of apprehension — the maximum number of objects that can be correctly assessed after a brief presentation
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