12-letter words containing b, i, s, u
- bird's mouth — a right-angled notch cut in the underside of a rafter for fitting over a longitudinal member, as a wall plate.
- biscuit ware — unglazed earthenware
- bismuthinite — a grey mineral consisting of bismuth sulphide in orthorhombic crystalline form. It occurs in veins associated with tin, copper, silver, lead, etc, and is a source of bismuth. Formula: Bi2S3
- bit stuffing — (protocol) A protocol which guarantees the receiver of synchronous data can recover the sender's clock. When the data stream sent contains a large number of adjacent bits which cause no transition of the signal, the receiver cannot adjust its clock to maintain proper synchronised reception. To eliminate the possibility of such a pathological case, when a preset number of transitionless bits have been transmitted, a bit which does cause a transition is "stuffed" (transmitted) by the sender. The receiver follows the same protocol and removes the stuffed bit after the specified number of transitionless bits, but can use the stuffed bit to recover the sender's clock. The advantage of bit stuffing is that only a bit (not a byte) is inserted in the data stream, and that only when the content of the data stream fails to provide a timing signal to the receiver. Thus very nearly 100% of the bits transported are useful data. In contrast, asynchronous transmission of data "throws away" a start bit and one or more stop bits for each data byte sent.
- biting louse — any wingless insect of the order Mallophaga, such as the chicken louse: external parasites of birds and mammals with biting mouthparts
- biuniqueness — the quality of a one-to-one correspondence
- black muslim — a member of the Black Muslims
- blastulation — the process of blastula formation
- blind summit — a point on a road where a vehicle approaching the top of a hill or incline cannot see vehicles approaching up the other side of the hill
- blissfulness — full of, abounding in, enjoying, or conferring bliss.
- blister rust — a disease of certain pines caused by rust fungi of the genus Cronartium, causing swellings on the bark from which orange masses of spores are released
- blockbusting — A blockbusting film or book is one that is very successful, usually because it is very exciting.
- bloodsucking — any animal that sucks blood, especially a leech.
- blue catfish — a large freshwater catfish, Ictalurus furcatus, that is a popular food fish in the states of the Mississippi River valley.
- blue devil's — a blue capsule or tablet containing the barbiturate amobarbital or its derivative.
- blue jasmine — a southern U.S. shrubby vine, Clematis crispa, of the buttercup family, having solitary, bell-shaped, blue or bluish-purple to pink flowers and bearing fruit with silky appendages.
- blue springs — a town in W Missouri.
- blue stilton — a rich cheese made from whole milk, blue-veined and very strong in flavour
- blue swimmer — an edible bluish Australian swimming crab, Portunus pelagicus
- blue thistle — blueweed (def 1).
- blue-singlet — working-class
- blue-thistle — Also called blue thistle. a bristly weed, Echium vulgare, of the borage family, having showy blue flowers, a native of Europe naturalized in the U.S.
- blues guitar — blues guitar music
- bluesnarfing — the practice of using one Bluetooth-enabled mobile phone to steal contact details, ring tones, images, etc from another
- bluestocking — A bluestocking is an intellectual woman.
- boiler house — a building housing a boiler
- boisterously — rough and noisy; noisily jolly or rowdy; clamorous; unrestrained: the sound of boisterous laughter.
- bootylicious — sexually attractive, esp with curvaceous buttocks
- booze cruise — a day trip to a foreign country, esp from England across the English Channel to France, for the purposes of buying cheap alcohol, cigarettes, etc
- bourgeoisify — to convert to a bourgeois attitude or appearance
- brains trust — a group of knowledgeable people who discuss topics in public or on radio or television
- braunschweig — Brunswick
- bridal suite — a room or set of rooms in a hotel for newly married couples
- bridge house — a deckhouse including a bridge or bridges for navigation.
- bristlemouth — any of several small, deep-sea fishes of the family Gonostomatidae, having numerous sharp, slender teeth covering the jaws.
- brunelleschi — Filippo (fiˈlippo). 1377–1446, Italian architect, whose works in Florence include the dome of the cathedral, the Pazzi chapel of Santa Croce, and the church of San Lorenzo
- brushability — the quality of being brushable
- buccaneerish — of or relating to a buccaneer
- buenos aires — the capital of Argentina, a major port and industrial city on the Río de la Plata estuary: became capital in 1880; university (1821). Pop: 13 349 000 (2005 est)
- buffalo fish — any of a genus (Ictiobus) of large, humpbacked, freshwater sucker fishes found in North America
- bull mastiff — a large powerful breed of dog with a short usually fawn or brindle coat, developed by crossing the bulldog with the mastiff
- bull session — A bull session is an informal conversation among a small group of people.
- bull thistle — a tall, spiny thistle, Cirsium vulgare, having heads of pink to purple flowers: a common weed in North America.
- bunco artist — a confidence trickster or con artist
- burkina faso — an inland republic in W Africa: dominated by Mossi kingdoms (10th–19th centuries); French protectorate established in 1896; became an independent republic in 1960; consists mainly of a flat savanna plateau. Official language: French; Mossi and other African languages also widely spoken. Religion: mostly animist, with a large Muslim minority. Currency: franc. Capital: Ouagadougou. Pop: 17 812 961 (2013 est). Area: 273 200 sq km (105 900 sq miles)
- burning bush — a rutaceous shrub, Dictamnus fraxinella, of S Europe and Asia, whose glands release a volatile inflammable oil that can burn without harming the plant: identified as the bush from which God spoke to Moses (Exodus 3:2–4)
- burnt sienna — a reddish-brown dye or pigment obtained by roasting raw sienna in a furnace
- burro's tail — a succulent Mexican plant, Sedum morganianum, of the stonecrop family, bearing small, rose-colored flowers and long, hanging, nearly cylindrical stems with closely packed whitish-green leaves.
- bush singlet — a black woollen singlet often worn by farm labourers
- bushfighting — fighting in the bush