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14-letter words containing b, r, i, e

  • belletristical — relating to the fine arts
  • belo horizonte — a city in SE Brazil, the capital of Minas Gerais state. Pop: 5 304 000 (2005 est)
  • belvoir castle — a castle in Leicestershire, near Grantham (in Lincolnshire): seat of the Dukes of Rutland; rebuilt by James Wyatt in 1816
  • benzene series — a series of aromatic hydrocarbons derived from benzene by replacing one or more of the hydrogen atoms with one or more methyl groups. The first three members are benzene, toluene, and xylene.
  • berberidaceous — of, relating to, or belonging to the Berberidaceae, a mainly N temperate family of flowering plants (mostly shrubs), including barberry and barrenwort
  • berkner island — an island in Antarctica, in the S Weddell Sea, between the Ronne Ice Shelf and the Filchner Ice Shelf.
  • bernicle goose — barnacle goose
  • beta geminorum — Pollux
  • beta reduction — [lambda-calculus] The application of a lambda abstraction to an argument expression. A copy of the body of the lambda abstraction is made and occurrences of the bound variable being replaced by the argument. E.g. (\ x . x+1) 4 --> 4+1 Beta reduction is the only kind of reduction in the pure lambda-calculus. The opposite of beta reduction is beta abstraction. These are the two kinds of beta conversion. See also name capture.
  • beta-endorphin — a potent endorphin released by the anterior pituitary gland in response to pain, trauma, exercise, or other forms of stress.
  • beveridge plan — the plan for comprehensive social insurance, proposed by Sir William Beveridge in Great Britain in 1941.
  • bewilderedness — the state of being bewildered
  • bezier surface — (graphics)   A surface defined by mathematical formulae, used in computer graphics. A surface P(u, v), where u and v vary orthogonally from 0 to 1 from one edge of the surface to the other, is defined by a set of (n+1)*(m+1) "control points" (X(i, j), Y(i, j), Z(i, j)) for i = 0 to n, j = 0 to m.
  • bib and tucker — an outfit of clothes (esp in the phrase best bib and tucker)
  • biceps brachii — See under biceps.
  • biceps femoris — See under biceps.
  • bicycle-racing — the act or sport of riding or traveling by bicycle, motorcycle, etc.
  • bidding prayer — the formal petitionary prayer, said especially in the Anglican Church immediately before the sermon.
  • big blue river — a river in SE Nebraska, flowing E and SE to the Kansas (Kaw) River. 300 miles (483 km) long.
  • big brotherism — paternalistic authoritarianism that seeks to supply the needs and regulate the conduct of people.
  • big government — a form of government characterized by high taxation and public spending and centralization of political power
  • big red switch — (jargon)   (BRS) IBM jargon for the power switch on a computer, especially the "Emergency Pull" switch on an IBM mainframe or the power switch on an IBM PC where it really is large and red. "This [email protected]%$% bitty box is hung again; time to hit the Big Red Switch." It is alleged that the emergency pull switch on an IBM 360/91 actually fired a non-conducting bolt into the main power feed; the BRSes on more recent mainframes physically drop a block into place so that they can't be pushed back in. People get fired for pulling them, especially inappropriately (see also molly-guard). Compare power cycle, three-finger salute, 120 reset; see also scram switch.
  • bildungsromane — a type of novel concerned with the education, development, and maturing of a young protagonist.
  • billiard table — the rectangular table used for playing billiards
  • binary counter — (electronics, hardware)   A digital circuit which has a clock input and a number of count outputs which give the number of clock cycles. The output may change either on rising or falling clock edges. The circuit may also have a reset input which sets all outputs to zero when asserted. The counter may be either a synchronous counter or a ripple counter.
  • binary package — (software)   An archive file that contains all files and directories that must be installed in order to make a working installation of the program(s) included in the package, and the maintainer scripts necessary for the installation. A binary package is usually specific to a certain platform, in contrast to a source package.
  • binding energy — the energy that must be supplied to a stable nucleus before it can undergo fission. It is equal to the mass defect
  • binding rafter — a timber for supporting rafters between their extremities, as a purlin.
  • binding strake — a very strong, heavy strake of planking, especially one next to a sheer strake.
  • binge drinking — Binge drinking is the consumption of large amounts of alcohol within a short period of time.
  • bioaeronautics — the use of aircraft in the discovery, development, and protection of natural and biological resources
  • bioarchaeology — the branch of archaeology that deals with the remains of living things
  • biocybernetics — the branch of cybernetics that deals with the control and communication systems of living organisms
  • biodegradation — to decay and become absorbed by the environment: toys that will biodegrade when they're discarded.
  • bioelectricity — electricity generated by a living organism
  • bioelectronics — a branch of electronics that deals with electronic devices, implants, etc. used in medicine and biological research
  • bioengineering — People sometimes use bioengineering to talk about genetic engineering.
  • biometeorology — the study of the effect of weather conditions on living organisms
  • biometric risk — Biometric risk covers all risks related to human life conditions, such as death, birth, disability, age, and number of children.
  • bioprospecting — searching for plant or animal species for use as a source of commercially exploitable products, such as medicinal drugs
  • bioregionalism — the conviction that environmental and social policies should be determined by the bioregion rather than economics or politics
  • bioregionalist — someone who believes in bioregionalism
  • bioremediation — the use of plants to extract heavy metals from contaminated soils and water
  • bircher muesli — a type of muesli containing softened oats, dried fruit, and apple
  • birdcage clock — lantern clock.
  • birds and bees — any warm-blooded vertebrate of the class Aves, having a body covered with feathers, forelimbs modified into wings, scaly legs, a beak, and no teeth, and bearing young in a hard-shelled egg.
  • biscuit barrel — an airtight container of circular section equipped with a lid and used for storing biscuits
  • bishop's mitre — a European heteropterous bug, Aelia acuminata, whose larvae are a pest of cereal grasses: family Pentatomidae
  • bit error rate — A bit error rate is the measure of the number of incorrect bits that can be expected in a specified number of bits in a serial stream.
  • bits per pixel — (hardware, graphics)   (bpp) The number of bits of information stored per pixel of an image or displayed by a graphics adapter. The more bits there are, the more colours can be represented, but the more memory is required to store or display the image. A colour can be described by the intensities of red, green and blue (RGB) components. Allowing 8 bits (1 byte) per component (24 bits per pixel) gives 256 levels for each component and over 16 million different colours - more than the human eye can distinguish. Microsoft Windows [and others?] calls this truecolour. An image of 1024x768 with 24 bpp requires over 2 MB of memory. "High colour" uses 16 bpp (or 15 bpp), 5 bits for blue, 5 bits for red and 6 bits for green. This reduced colour precision gives a slight loss of image quality at a 1/3 saving on memory. Standard VGA uses a palette of 16 colours (4 bpp), each colour in the palette is 24 bit. Standard SVGA uses a palette of 256 colours (8 bpp). Some graphics hardware and software support 32-bit colour depths, including an 8-bit "alpha channel" for transparency effects.
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