20-letter words containing e, m, t, o, p
- music of the spheres — a music, imperceptible to human ears, formerly supposed to be produced by the movements of the spheres or heavenly bodies.
- neapolitan ice cream — variously flavored and colored ice cream and ice mixtures frozen in layers.
- neon lamp (or tube) — a discharge lamp containing neon, that ionizes and glows with a red light (neon light) when an electric current is sent through it: used esp. in advertising signs
- net domestic product — the gross domestic product minus an allowance for the depreciation of capital goods
- new democratic party — the Canadian social democratic party formed in 1961
- next program counter — (architecture) (nPC) A register in a CPU that contains the address of the instruction to be executed next.
- nonrepeating decimal — a decimal representation of any irrational number, having the property that no sequence of digits is repeated ad infinitum.
- north american plate — a major tectonic division of the earth's crust, comprising Greenland and the continent of North America and the suboceanic Labrador and North American Basins, and bounded on the east by the Mid-Atlantic Ridge, on the south by the Caribbean and South American Plates, and on the west by the San Andreas fault and Aleutian Trench.
- north temperate zone — the part of the earth's surface between the tropic of Cancer and the Arctic Circle.
- objective complement — object complement.
- omega-minus particle — a baryon with strangeness −3, isotopic spin 0, and negative charge; predicted from the mathematics of the Eightfold Way and subsequently discovered. Symbol: Ω −.
- one's misspent youth — the period when one is young and spend's one's time doing foolish, bad, or frivolous things
- one's spiritual home — Your spiritual home is the place where you feel that you belong, usually because your ideas or attitudes are the same as those of the people who live there.
- ophthalmodynamometer — a device for determining the nearest point of ocular convergence.
- optical mark reading — the reading of marks by an optical device whereby the information can be stored in machine-readable form
- orthopaedic mattress — a specially firm mattress designed to help correct or ameliorate the discomfort of disorders of the spine and joints
- pale western cutworm — the larva of a noctuid moth, Agrotis orthogonia, of the western U.S. and Canada, that seriously damages grains, beets, potatoes, alfalfa, etc., by feeding underground on roots and stems.
- paper chromatography — the separation of mixtures into their constituents by preferential adsorption by a solid, as a column of silica (column chromatography) or a strip of filter paper (paper chromatography) or by a gel.
- parametric equations — one of two or more equations expressing the location of a point on a curve or surface by determining each coordinate separately.
- particle beam weapon — a weapon that fires particle beams into the atmosphere or space
- pass the time of day — to exchange casual greetings (with an acquaintance)
- patent foramen ovale — a congenital heart defect resulting from failure of the foramen ovale to close shortly after birth.
- paternal grandmother — the mother of someone's father
- peak programme meter — an instrument for assessing the maximum levels of an electrical sound signal
- pentobarbital sodium — a barbiturate drug used in medicine as a sedative and hypnotic. Formula: C11H17N2O3Na
- peremptory challenge — a formal objection to the service of a juror by a party to a criminal prosecution or a civil action that requires no showing of cause.
- peremptory exception — a plea in bar of an action.
- periodontal membrane — the collagenous, fibrous connective tissue between the cementum of the tooth and the alveolus.
- personnel department — business: human resources
- personnel management — the branch of management dealing with staff recruitment and matters relating to employees
- phenyldiethanolamine — a white, crystalline, slightly water-soluble substance, C 1 0 H 1 5 NO 2 , used in the manufacture of dyes and in organic synthesis.
- physical examination — an examination, usually by a physician, of a person's body in order to determine his or her state of health or physical fitness, as for military service or participation in a sport.
- physical meteorology — the branch of meteorology dealing with the study of optical, electrical, acoustical, and thermodynamic phenomena in the atmosphere, including the physics of clouds and precipitation.
- piezomagnetic effect — the production of a magnetic field by applying a mechanical stress to certain crystals
- poor man's something — a (cheaper) substitute for something
- population parameter — a quantity or statistical measure that, for a given population, is fixed and that is used as the value of a variable in some general distribution or frequency function to make it descriptive of that population: The mean and variance of a population are population parameters.
- portfolio employment — the practice of working for several employers simultaneously rather than working full-time for a single employer
- potassium antimonate — a white, crystalline, slightly water-soluble powder, KSbO 3 , used chiefly as a pigment in paints.
- potassium bichromate — an orange-red, crystalline, water-soluble, poisonous powder, K 2 Cr 2 O 7 , used chiefly in dyeing, photography, and as a laboratory reagent.
- potassium binoxalate — a white, crystalline, hygroscopic, poisonous solid, KHC 2 O 4 , that is usually hydrated: used chiefly for removing ink stains, cleaning metal and wood, and in photography.
- potassium bitartrate — cream of tartar.
- potassium dichromate — an orange-red crystalline soluble solid substance that is a good oxidizing agent and is used in making chrome pigments and as a bleaching agent. Formula: K2Cr2O7
- potassium-bitartrate — a white, crystalline, water-soluble powder, C 4 H 5 KO 6 , used chiefly as an ingredient in baking powders and in galvanic tinning of metals. Also called potassium bitartrate, potassium acid tartrate. Compare tartar (def 3).
- power of appointment — the authority granted by a donor to a donee to select the person or persons who are to enjoy property rights or income upon the death of the donor or of the donee or after the termination of existing rights or interests.
- precision instrument — finely-tuned device
- predicate nominative — (in Latin, Greek, and certain other languages) a predicate noun or adjective in the nominative case.
- premenstrual tension — Premenstrual tension is the same as premenstrual syndrome. The abbreviation PMT is often used.
- presentation manager — The elephantine graphical user interface to the OS/2 operating system.
- price discrimination — the practice of offering identical goods to different buyers at different prices, when the goods cost the same.
- pride of the morning — light mist or precipitation observed at sea in the morning and regarded as indicating a fine day.