18-letter words containing c, a, i
- countertherapeutic — Working against a therapy.
- countryside agency — (in England) a government agency that promotes the conservation and enjoyment of the countryside and aims to stimulate employment in rural areas
- coupling capacitor — A coupling capacitor is a capacitor that is used to transmit an alternating current signal from one node to another.
- cracked distillate — A cracked distillate is a clear yellow liquid, mostly containing hydrocarbons, which is produced by steam cracking without a catalyst.
- cranial osteopathy — osteopathy that focuses on the cranium and the spine
- craniorachischisis — Lb pathology A defect of the neural tube in which both the brain and spinal cord are left open.
- creatine phosphate — phosphocreatine.
- credibility rating — a supposed measure of how far a person can be believed or trusted
- creeping featurism — (jargon) /kree'ping fee'chr-izm/ (Or "feature creep") A systematic tendency to load more chrome and features onto systems at the expense of whatever elegance they may have possessed when originally designed. "The main problem with BSD Unix has always been creeping featurism." More generally, creeping featurism is the tendency for anything to become more complicated because people keep saying "Gee, it would be even better if it had this feature too". The result is usually a patchwork because it grew one ad-hoc step at a time, rather than being planned. Planning is a lot of work, but it's easy to add just one extra little feature to help someone, and then another, and another, .... When creeping featurism gets out of hand, it's like a cancer. Usually this term is used to describe computer programs, but it could also be said of the federal government, the IRS 1040 form, and new cars. A similar phenomenon sometimes afflicts conscious redesigns; see second-system effect. See also creeping elegance.
- creeping paralysis — any slow process that causes a system, government, etc, to stop working efficiently
- creme de framboise — a liqueur flavored with raspberries.
- crested dog's-tail — a common wiry perennial grass, Cynosurus cristatus, of meadows and pasture
- criminal profiling — the analysis of a person's psychological and behavioural characteristics, so as to assess whether they are likely to have committed a crime under investigation
- critical apparatus — the variant readings, footnotes, etc found in a scholarly work or a critical edition of a text
- critical constants — the physical constants that express the properties of a substance in its critical state
- crookes radiometer — a type of radiometer consisting of an evacuated glass bulb containing a set of lightweight vanes, each blackened on one side. The vanes are mounted on a vertical axis and revolve when light, or other radiant energy, falls on them
- cross-disciplinary — linking two or more fields of study
- crude oil desalter — A crude oil desalter is equipment which removes inorganic salts from crude oil, using chemical or electrostatic separation.
- crude oil fraction — A crude oil fraction is a component of crude oil, which has its own particular molecular composition, weight, and boiling point.
- crystal microphone — a microphone that uses a piezoelectric crystal to convert sound energy into electrical energy
- crystal oscillator — a clear, transparent mineral or glass resembling ice.
- cultural diffusion — act of diffusing; state of being diffused.
- cultural diversity — the cultural variety and cultural differences that exist in the world, a society, or an institution: Dying languages and urbanization are threats to cultural diversity.
- cultural pluralism — a condition in which minority groups participate fully in the dominant society, yet maintain their cultural differences.
- cultural sociology — the study of the origins and development of societal institutions, norms, and practices.
- cultural universal — a cultural pattern extant in every known society.
- cumbrian mountains — a mountain range in NW England, in Cumbria. Highest peak: Scafell Pike, 977 m (3206 ft)
- cumulative scoring — a method of scoring in which the score of a partnership is taken as the sum of their scores on all hands played.
- cunninghame graham — R(obert) B(ontine). 1852–1936, Scottish traveller, writer, and politician, noted for his essays and short stories: first president (1928) of the Scottish Nationalist Party
- curvature of field — a monochromatic aberration of a lens or other optical system in which the focal surface is curved, the refracted image of an object oriented perpendicular to the axis of the lens lying on a curved surface rather than in a plane perpendicular to the axis.
- custodial sentence — a sentence given by a court that involves a term of imprisonment
- customer relations — Customer relations are the relationships that a business has with its customers and the way in which it treats them.
- customs and excise — Customs and Excise is a British government department which is responsible for collecting taxes on imported and exported goods. Compare Customs Service.
- cytoarchitectonics — Cytoarchitecture.
- dagwood (sandwich) — a thick sandwich with a variety of fillings, often of apparently incompatible foods
- data communication — electronic transmission of information that has been encoded for storage and processing by computers.
- de-objectification — to present as an object, especially of sight, touch, or other physical sense; make objective; externalize.
- dead-letter office — an office where undeliverable letters were taken for storage
- dead-stick landing — Aeronautics, Aerospace. a landing of an airplane or space vehicle with the engine cut off.
- debt consolidation — the process of taking out a new loan (often secured on one's property) in order to pay off a number of existing debts
- decachlorobiphenyl — (organic compound) The fully chlorinated polychlorinated biphenyl containing ten chlorine atoms.
- dechristianization — The act of dechristianizing; the systematic removal of Christianity or Christian elements.
- declaration of war — a formal statement made by one country to another that a state of war now exists between them
- decompartmentalize — to remove excessive compartmentalization from (an organization)
- deductive database — (database) A combination of a conventional database containing facts, a knowledge base containing rules, and an inference engine which allows the derivation of information implied by the facts and rules. Commonly, the knowledge base is expressed in a subset of first-order logic and either a SLDNF or Datalog inference engine is used.
- deficiency account — an account summarizing the financial condition of an individual or company in danger of bankruptcy.
- deficiency disease — any condition, such as pellagra, beriberi, or scurvy, produced by a lack of vitamins or other essential substances
- deficiency payment — a payment made to a commodity producer that represents the difference between the market price and the guaranteed price
- democratic deficit — any situation in which there is believed to be a lack of democratic accountability and control over the decision-making process
- depth-first search — (algorithm) A graph search algorithm which extends the current path as far as possible before backtracking to the last choice point and trying the next alternative path. Depth-first search may fail to find a solution if it enters a cycle in the graph. This can be avoided if we never extend a path to a node which it already contains. Opposite of breadth first search. See also iterative deepening.