17-letter words containing a, s, l, o
- leizhou peninsula — a peninsula of SE China, in SW Guangdong province, separated from Hainan Island by Hainan Strait
- letters of marque — a former government document authorizing an individual to make reprisals on the subjects of an enemy nation, specif. to arm a ship and capture enemy merchant ships and cargo
- 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 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
- librocubicularist — (rare) A person who reads in bed.
- light dawns on sb — If light dawns on you, you begin to understand something after a period of not being able to understand it.
- limousine liberal — a wealthy left-wing person
- lincoln's sparrow — a North American sparrow, Melospiza lincolnii, having a buff breast with black streaks.
- 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.
- linking consonant — a consonant inserted between two vowels in speech
- lipopolysaccaride — a molecule, consisting of lipid and polysaccharide components, that is the main constituent of the cell walls of Gram-negative bacteria
- lithostratigraphy — the study or character of stratified rocks based solely on their physical and petrographic features.
- livingstone daisy — a gardener's name for various species of Mesembryanthemum, esp M. criniflorum, grown as garden annuals (though several are perennial) for their brightly coloured showy flowers: family Aizoaceae
- 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 anaesthesia — the use of anaesthetics that affect a particular area of the body
- local anaesthetic — sth injected to numb a body part for pain relief
- loco supra citato — l.s.c.
- loggerhead shrike — a common, North American shrike, Lanius ludovicianus, gray above and white below with black wings, tail, and facial mask.
- lombrosian school — a school of criminology, promulgating the theories and employing the methods developed by Lombroso.
- long island sound — an arm of the Atlantic between Connecticut and Long Island. 90 miles (145 km) long.
- loose-leaf binder — a hard cover with metal rings inside which is used to hold loose pieces of paper
- lose the exchange — to lose a rook in return for a bishop or knight
- louisiana tanager — western tanager.
- luminous efficacy — the quotient of the luminous flux of a radiation and its corresponding radiant flux
- luminous exitance — the ability of a surface to emit light expressed as the luminous flux per unit area at a specified point on the surface
- lymphadenopathies — Plural form of lymphadenopathy.
- lyon king of arms — the chief herald of Scotland
- 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)
- machado y morales — Gerardo [he-rahr-th aw] /hɛˈrɑr ðɔ/ (Show IPA), 1871–1939, president of Cuba 1925–33.
- macro-linguistics — a field of study concerned with language in its broadest sense and including cultural and behavioral features associated with language.
- magellanic clouds — either of two irregular galactic clusters in the southern heavens that are the nearest independent star system to the Milky Way.
- magnetoelasticity — the phenomenon, consisting of a change in magnetic properties, exhibited by a ferromagnetic material to which stress is applied.
- maintained school — a school financially supported by the state
- maison de moliere — Comédie Française.
- make light of sth — If you make light of something, you treat it as though it is not serious or important, when in fact it is.
- make no apologies — If you say that you make no apologies for what you have done, you are emphasizing that you feel that you have done nothing wrong.
- maladministration — to administer or manage badly or inefficiently: The mayor was a bungler who maladministered the city budget.
- malayo-polynesian — a family of languages extending from Madagascar to the central Pacific, including Malagasy, Malay, Indonesian, Tagalog, and Polynesian
- manchester school — a school of economists in England in the first half of the 19th century, devoted to free trade and the repeal of the Corn Law, led by Richard Cobden and John Bright.
- manitoulin island — an island in N Lake Huron belonging to Canada. 80 miles (130 km) long.
- marital relations — a euphemistic term for sexual intercourse between married partners
- maxwell equations — equations developed by James Clerk Maxwell (1831–79) upon which classical electromagnetic theory is based
- meissen porcelain — Dresden china.
- melissopalynology — The study of honey and its composition.
- mensural notation — a system of musical notation of the 13th to the late 16th centuries, marked by the use of note symbols such as the longa and brevis, the absence of bar lines and ties, and the equivalence in value of one note to either two or three of the next smaller degree.
- messier catalogue — a catalogue of 103 nonstellar objects, such as nebulae and galaxies, prepared in 1781–86. An object is referred to by its number in this catalogue, for example the Andromeda Galaxy is referred to as M31
- metallofullerenes — Plural form of metallofullerene.
- metalloproteinase — (enzyme) Any of several proteinases that have a metal atom (often zinc) at their active centre.
- methyl isocyanate — Chemistry. a highly toxic, flammable, colorless liquid, CH 3 NCO, used as an intermediate in the manufacture of pesticides: in 1984, the accidental release of a cloud of this gas in Bhopal, India, killed more than 1700 people and injured over 200,000.