16-letter words containing b, e, r, p
- operating budget — money allocated to a project
- outboard profile — an exterior side elevation of a vessel, showing all deck structures, rigging, fittings, etc.
- oversubscription — to subscribe for more of than is available, expected, or required: The charity drive was oversubscribed by several thousand dollars.
- paint-by-numbers — formulaic; showing no original thought or creativity
- paratuberculosis — Johne's disease.
- pass-band filter — band-pass filter
- peach tree borer — the larva of any of several clearwing moths, as Sanninoidea exitiosa, that bore into the wood of the peach and other drupaceous trees.
- performance bond — contract bond.
- permafrost table — the variable surface constituting the upper limit of permafrost. Compare frostline (def 2).
- personal liberty — the liberty of an individual to do his or her will freely except for those restraints imposed by law to safeguard the physical, moral, political, and economic welfare of others.
- philip r. bagley — (person) A pioneer of computer document retrieval. See metadata.
- phlebothrombosis — the presence of a thrombus in a vein.
- pietermaritzburg — a province in the E part of the Republic of South Africa. 35,284 sq. mi. (91,886 sq. km). Capital: Pietermaritzburg.
- pit bull terrier — American Staffordshire terrier.
- planetary nebula — an expanding shell of thin ionized gas that is ejected from and surrounds a hot, dying star of about the same mass as the sun; the gas absorbs ultraviolet radiation from the central star and reemits it as visible light by the process of fluorescence.
- platform-balance — a scale with a platform for holding the items to be weighed.
- plumber's helper — plunger (def 3).
- pocket billiards — pool2 (def 1).
- poor boy sweater — a snug-fitting, pullover sweater with ribbing on both the body and sleeves, worn by girls and women.
- portable airtime — (communications, wireless) A wireless, digital communications system enabling user-to-user voice communication, "quicknotes", and alphanumeric messaging.
- potato tuberworm — the larva of the potato moth.
- pourriture noble — noble rot.
- powerfully built — (of a person, esp a man) big and physically strong, with large muscles
- pre-subscription — a sum of money given or pledged as a contribution, payment, investment, etc.
- presence chamber — the special room in which a great personage, as a sovereign, receives guests, holds audiences, etc.
- presentation box — a specially designed and attractive box to hold a product, and make it look more impressive
- prisoner of bill — (humour) (PoB) A derisory term, in use generally among Unix users, for anyone who uses Microsoft products either because they don't know there is anything better (i.e. Unix) or because they would be incapable of working anything more complex (i.e. Unix). The interesting and widespread presumption among users of the term is that (at least at the time of writing, 1998) using anything other than Unix or a Microsoft OS (whether VMS, Macintosh, Amiga) is so eccentric a choice as to be at least somewhat praiseworthy.
- proboscis monkey — a reddish, arboreal monkey, Nasalis larvatus, of Borneo, the male of which has a long, flexible nose: an endangered species.
- projection booth — a soundproof compartment in a theater where a motion-picture projector is housed and from which the picture is projected on the screen.
- prometheus bound — a tragedy (c457 b.c.) by Aeschylus.
- proslambanomenos — the lowest note of the scale in ancient Greek music
- public ownership — ownership by the state; nationalization
- public relations — (used with a plural verb) the actions of a corporation, store, government, individual, etc., in promoting goodwill between itself and the public, the community, employees, customers, etc.
- query by example — (database, language) (QBE) A user-friendly query language developed by Moshé Zloof of IBM in 1975.
- rainbow seaperch — an embiotocid fish, Hypsurus caryi, living off the Pacific coast of North America, having red, orange, and blue stripes on the body.
- ramen profitable — If a startup business is ramen profitable, it is barely profitable, just enough to allow the founder to live on the cheapest diet.
- raspberry sawfly — a black sawfly, Monophadnoides geniculatus, the larvae of which feed on the leaves of the raspberry and blackberry.
- republican party — one of the two major political parties in the U.S.: originated 1854–56.
- republican river — a river flowing E from E Colorado through Nebraska and Kansas into the Kansas River. 422 miles (680 km) long.
- responsibilities — the state or fact of being responsible, answerable, or accountable for something within one's power, control, or management.
- saint petersburg — Also called Russian Empire. Russian Rossiya. a former empire in E Europe and N and W Asia: overthrown by the Russian Revolution 1917. Capital: St. Petersburg (1703–1917).
- schaumburg-lippe — a former state in NW Germany.
- self-approbation — approval; commendation.
- sharpe's grysbok — either of two small, usually solitary antelopes of southern Africa, Raphicerus melanotis, or R. sharpei (Sharpe's grysbok) having a light to dark reddish-brown coat speckled with white.
- showbiz reporter — a journalist who writes about the entertainment industry
- showy crab apple — a large Japanese bush or tree, Malus floribunda, of the rose family, having red fruit and rose-colored flowers that fade to white.
- slave labor camp — labor camp (def 1).
- soapberry family — the plant family Sapindaceae, characterized by chiefly tropical trees, shrubs, or herbaceous vines having compound leaves, clustered flowers, and berrylike, fleshy, or capsular fruit, and including the balloon vine, golden rain tree, litchi, and soapberry.
- sodium perborate — a white, crystalline, water-soluble solid, NaBO 2 ⋅3H 2 O or NaBO 3 ⋅4H 2 O, used chiefly as a bleaching agent and antiseptic.
- southern baptist — a member of the Southern Baptist Convention, founded in Augusta, Georgia, in 1845, that is strictly Calvinistic and active in religious publishing and education.