18-letter words containing c, i, s, e
- subsistence farmer — a farmer who consumes most of the produce he grows, leaving little or nothing to be marketed
- substitute teacher — educator: replaces sb temporarily
- sulfuric anhydride — sulfur trioxide.
- summary proceeding — a mode of trial authorized by statute to be held before a judge without the usual full hearing.
- superciliary ridge — browridge.
- superior vena cava — See under vena cava.
- supporting actress — an actress playing a supporting role
- surgical appliance — a specialized device used by somebody to relieve a particular medical condition
- survival mechanism — something you or your body does automatically, in order to survive in a dangerous or unpleasant situation
- swarm intelligence — the collective behaviour of a group of animals, esp social insects such as ants, bees, and termites, that are each following very basic rules
- swedish gymnastics — a system of passive and active exercising of muscles and joints
- sweptwing aircraft — an aircraft which has wings that are swept (usually) backwards
- symmetric function — a polynomial in several indeterminates that stays the same under any permutation of the indeterminates.
- sympathetic strike — sympathy strike.
- sympathetic string — a thin wire string, as in various obsolete musical instruments, designed to vibrate sympathetically with the bowed or plucked strings to reinforce the sound.
- synthetic division — a simplified procedure for dividing a polynomial by a linear polynomial.
- synthetic geometry — elementary geometry, as distinct from analytic geometry.
- systematic phoneme — a phonological unit in generative phonology representing an underlying form that takes into account the relationship between phonological patterns and morphological variation, as the unit underlying the second vowel in both derive and derivative.
- take out insurance — take out insurance against something
- tale of two cities — a historical novel (1859) by Dickens.
- teaching assistant — a graduate student in a college or university who is the recipient of a teaching fellowship. Abbreviation: TA.
- technical reserves — Technical reserves are amounts of money set aside to pay for underwriting liabilities.
- technical sergeant — a noncommissioned officer ranking below a master sergeant and above a staff sergeant.
- telecommunications — Sometimes, telecommunication. (used with a singular verb) the transmission of information, as words, sounds, or images, usually over great distances, in the form of electromagnetic signals, as by telegraph, telephone, radio, or television.
- teleobjective lens — telephoto lens.
- television cabinet — a cabinet on which a television set is placed or in which it is encased
- television company — a company that broadcasts programmes by television
- television licence — a certificate giving official permission to own a television set
- tertiary structure — the way in which the helixes or beta structures of a polypeptide are folded or arranged into a three-dimensional configuration.
- that's the ticket! — that's the correct or proper thing! that's right!
- the baptist church — any of various Protestant churches that believe in the baptism of believers
- the cat's whiskers — a person or thing that is excellent or superior
- the coast is clear — If you say that the coast is clear, you mean that there is nobody around to see you or catch you.
- the dismal science — a name for economics coined by Thomas Carlyle
- the encyclopedists — the writers of the French Encyclopedia (1751-72) edited by Diderot and d'Alembert, which contained the advanced ideas of the period
- the practicalities — the real facts or details of a situation, as opposed to its theoretical aspects
- the south atlantic — the part of the Atlantic Ocean that lies to the south of the equator
- the uncircumcision — the gentiles
- thermoluminescence — phosphorescence produced by the heating of a substance.
- thioarsenious acid — any of a group of hypothetical acids, H3AsS3, HAsS2, and H4As2S5, known only in the forms of their salts
- thirty-second note — a note having 1/32 of the time value of a whole note; demi-semiquaver.
- thirty-second rest — a rest equal in value to a thirty-second note.
- threatened species — a species likely, in the near future, to become an endangered species within all or much of its range.
- tick all the boxes — to satisfy all of the apparent requirements for success
- to cast aspersions — If you cast aspersions on someone or something, you suggest that they are not very good in some way.
- to close your mind — If you close your mind to something, you deliberately do not think about it or pay attention to it.
- to come unstitched — to go wrong or awry
- to lick into shape — If you lick, knock, or whip someone or something into shape, you use whatever methods are necessary to change or improve them so that they are in the condition that you want them to be in.
- to pick and choose — If you pick and choose, you carefully choose only things that you really want and reject the others.
- to scrape a living — If you say that someone scrapes a living or scratches a living, you mean that they manage to earn enough to live on, but it is very difficult. In American English, you say they scrape out a living or scratch out a living.