17-letter words containing a, r, e, n
- lares and penates — household gods
- 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.
- laryngopharyngeal — of, relating to, or involving the larynx and pharynx.
- latent strabismus — the tendency, controllable by muscular effort, for one or both eyes to exhibit strabismus.
- latter-day saints — a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
- laurent's theorem — the theorem that a function that is analytic on an annulus can be represented by a Laurent series on the annulus.
- law of reflection — the principle that when a ray of light, radar pulse, or the like, is reflected from a smooth surface the angle of reflection is equal to the angle of incidence, and the incident ray, the reflected ray, and the normal to the surface at the point of incidence all lie in the same plane.
- law of refraction — the principle that for a ray, radar pulse, or the like, that is incident on the interface of two media, the ratio of the sine of the angle of incidence to the sine of the angle of refraction is equal to the ratio of the velocity of the ray in the first medium to the velocity in the second medium and the incident ray, refracted ray, and normal to the surface at the point of incidence all lie in the same plane.
- leading indicator — A leading indicator is an economic indicator that changes before a change in the economy, and that can be used to predict future economic or financial activity.
- learned borrowing — a word or other linguistic form borrowed from a classical language into a modern language.
- learner's license — a provisional driving licence
- learning-disabled — pertaining to or having a learning disability: a learning-disabled child.
- least upper bound — an upper bound that is less than or equal to all the upper bounds of a particular set. 3 is the least upper bound of the set consisting of 1, 2, 3. Abbr.: lub.
- lebesgue integral — an integral obtained by application of the theory of measure and more general than the Riemann integral.
- legal proceedings — court case
- legendre equation — a differential equation of the form (1− x 2) d2y/dx2 − 2 xdy/dx + a (a + 1) y = 0, where a is an arbitrary constant.
- lempert operation — fenestration (def 3c).
- leonardo da vinci — Leonardo [lee-uh-nahr-doh,, ley-;; Italian le-aw-nahr-daw] /ˌli əˈnɑr doʊ,, ˌleɪ-;; Italian ˌlɛ ɔˈnɑr dɔ/ (Show IPA), Leonardo da Vinci.
- lettre de creance — letter of credit.
- level compensator — an automatic gain control device used in the receivers of telegraphic circuits.
- lexical insertion — the process in which actual morphemes of a language are substituted either for semantic material or for place-fillers in the course of a derivation of a sentence
- liberal education — an education based primarily on the liberal arts, emphasizing the development of intellectual abilities as opposed to the acquisition of professional skills.
- lie in wait (for) — to wait so as to catch after planning an ambush or trap (for)
- life and/or death — If you say that something is a matter of life and death, you are emphasizing that it is extremely important, often because someone may die or suffer great harm if people do not act immediately.
- lifelong learning — the provision or use of both formal and informal learning opportunities throughout people's lives in order to foster the continuous development and improvement of the knowledge and skills needed for employment and personal fulfilment
- light mineral oil — a colorless, oily, almost tasteless, water-insoluble liquid, usually of either a standard light density (light mineral oil) or a standard heavy density (heavy mineral oil) consisting of mixtures of hydrocarbons obtained from petroleum by distillation: used chiefly as a lubricant, in the manufacture of cosmetics, and in medicine as a laxative.
- ligurian republic — the republic in NW Italy set up by Napoleon in 1797, incorporated into France in 1805, and united with the Kingdom of Sardinia in 1814.
- limousine liberal — a wealthy left-wing person
- 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.
- linear assignment — assignment problem
- linear dependence — (in linear algebra) the property of a set of elements in a vector space in which at least one of the vectors in the set can be written as a linear combination of the others.
- liquid propellant — a rocket propellant in liquid form.
- literacy campaign — a campaign designed to reduce illiteracy and promote literacy in a country, area, etc
- lithium carbonate — a colorless crystalline compound, Li 2 CO 3 , slightly soluble in water: used in ceramic and porcelain glazes, pharmaceuticals, and luminescent paints.
- litigation friend — a person acting on behalf of an infant or other person under legal disability
- logical operation — Boolean operation.
- loose-leaf binder — a hard cover with metal rings inside which is used to hold loose pieces of paper
- louisiana tanager — western tanager.
- luggage insurance — insurance against the loss of luggage while travelling
- lumpenproletariat — the lowest level of the proletariat comprising unskilled workers, vagrants, and criminals and characterized by a lack of class identification and solidarity.
- macdonnell ranges — a mountain system of central Australia, in S central Northern Territory, extending about 160 km (100 miles) east and west of Alice Springs. Highest peak: Mount Zeil, 1531 m (5024 ft)
- macfarlane burnet — Sir (Frank) Macfarlane [muh k-fahr-luh n] /məkˈfɑr lən/ (Show IPA), 1899–1985, Australian physician: Nobel Prize in Physiology 1960.
- macroevolutionary — Pertaining to, or as a result of macroevolution.
- macroinvertebrate — (zoology) An invertebrate that is large enough to be seen without the use of a microscope.
- madiba generation — the generation born around 1994, when Nelson Mandela became the first president of a multiracial South Africa
- magellan barberry — an evergreen shrub, Berberis buxifolia, of southern Chile, having prickle-tipped leaves, dark-purple fruit, and orange-yellow flowers, rarely flowering in cultivation.
- magnetic meridian — a line on the earth's surface, passing in the direction of the horizontal component of the earth's magnetic field.
- magnetic roasting — roasting of a nonmagnetic ore to render it magnetic so that it can be separated from gangue by means of a magnetic field.
- magnetic rotation — Faraday effect.
- magnetizing force — that part of the magnetic induction that is determined at any point in space by the current density and displacement current at that point independently of the magnetic or other physical properties of the surrounding medium. Symbol: H.