21-letter words containing i, b, m
- forward compatibility — (jargon) The ability to accept input from later versions of itself. Forward compatibility is harder to achieve than backward compatibility, since, in the backward case, the input format is know whereas a forward compatible system needs to cope gracefully with unknown future features. An example of future compatibility is the stipulation that a web browser should ignore HTML tags it does not recognise. See also extensible.
- franco-belgian system — French system.
- give someone the best — to concede someone's superiority
- give someone the bird — to tell someone rudely to depart; scoff at; hiss
- hindu-arabic numerals — Arabic numeral.
- hypogammaglobulinemia — A type of immune disorder characterised by a reduction in all types of gamma globulins.
- ibm customer engineer — (job) (CE) A hardware guy from IBM.
- imprecise probability — (probability) A probability that is represented as an interval (as opposed to a single number) included in [0,1].
- irish republican army — an underground Irish nationalist organization founded to work for Irish independence from Great Britain: declared illegal by the Irish government in 1936, but continues activity aimed at the unification of the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland. Abbreviation: IRA, I.R.A.
- knights of st columba — an international, semi-secret fraternal and charitable order for Catholic laymen, which originated in New Haven, Connecticut in 1882 (the Knights of Columbus)
- know someone by sight — If you know someone by sight, you can recognize them when you see them, although you have never met them and talked to them.
- lady murasaki shikibu — Lady, 978?–1031? Japanese poet and novelist.
- lambeth quadrilateral — the four essentials agreed upon at the Lambeth Conference of 1888 for a United Christian Church, namely, the Holy Scriptures, the Apostles' Creed, the sacraments of baptism and Holy Communion, and the historic episcopate
- long-term liabilities — Long-term liabilities are debts that a company does not have to pay back for a year or more.
- magnetic permeability — permeability (def 2).
- magnificent riflebird — a bird of paradise, Craspedophora magnifica
- maître d'hôtel butter — melted butter mixed with parsley and lemon juice
- make one's blood boil — the fluid that circulates in the principal vascular system of human beings and other vertebrates, in humans consisting of plasma in which the red blood cells, white blood cells, and platelets are suspended.
- maple-leaved viburnum — dockmackie.
- marketable securities — Marketable securities are securities that can easily be sold quickly on the open market.
- mayor of casterbridge — a novel (1886) by Thomas Hardy.
- megaloblastic anaemia — any anaemia, esp pernicious anaemia, characterized by the presence of megaloblasts in the blood or bone marrow
- member of the wedding — a novel (1946) and play (1950) by Carson McCullers.
- metabotropic receptor — an indirect receptor which initiates an intracellular biochemical cascade after it is triggered by an agonistic ligand
- methyltrinitrobenzene — TNT.
- mistress of the robes — (in Britain) a lady of high rank in charge of the Queen's wardrobe
- negotiable instrument — order or promise to pay money
- night-blooming cereus — any of various cacti of the genera Hylocereus, Peniocereus, Nyctocereus, or Selenicereus, having large, usually white flowers that open at night.
- nine-banded armadillo — an armadillo, Dasypus novemcinctus, of the southern U.S. to Argentina, having nine hinged bands of bony plates, the female of which usually gives birth to quadruplets that are always of the same sex.
- northumberland strait — the part of the Gulf of St. Lawrence that separates Prince Edward Island from New Brunswick and Nova Scotia, in SE Canada. About 200 miles (320 km) long; 9–30 miles (15–48 km) wide.
- pick someone's brains — to obtain information or ideas from someone
- potassium bicarbonate — a white, crystalline, slightly alkaline, salty-tasting, water-soluble powder, KHCO 3 , produced by the passage of carbon dioxide through an aqueous potassium carbonate solution: used in cookery as a leavening agent and in medicine as an antacid.
- premium savings bonds — (in Britain) bonds issued by the Treasury since 1956 for purchase by the public. No interest is paid but there is a monthly draw for cash prizes of various sums
- private member's bill — In Britain, a Private Member's Bill is a law that is proposed by a Member of Parliament acting as an individual rather than as a member of his or her political party.
- probable maximum loss — Probable maximum loss is the maximum amount of loss that can be expected under normal circumstances.
- propantheline bromide — a substance, C 2 3 H 3 0 BrNO 3 , used in the treatment of peptic ulcers.
- proton-pump inhibitor — any of a group of drugs used to treat excessive secretion of acid in the stomach and any resulting ulcers. They block the enzyme (proton pump) in the cells of the gastric glands that secrete hydrochloric acid
- public address system — loudspeaker
- public administration — the implementation of public policy, largely by the executive branch.
- public-address system — a combination of electronic devices that makes sound audible via loudspeakers to many people, as in an auditorium or out of doors.
- pure imaginary number — a complex number of the form iy where y is a real number and i = .
- recompression chamber — hyperbaric chamber.
- relative permeability — the ratio of the permeability of a medium to that of free space
- reverberation chamber — a room with walls that reflect sound. It is used to make acoustic measurements and as a source of reverberant sound to be mixed with direct sound for recording or broadcasting
- roodepoort-maraisburg — a city in S Transvaal, in the NE Republic of South Africa.
- rub someone's nose in — to keep reminding someone of something unpleasant, as a mistake made
- salam-weinberg theory — the electroweak theory.
- sampling distribution — the distribution of a statistic based on all possible random samples that can be drawn from a given population.
- san gabriel mountains — a mountain range in S California, N of Los Angeles. Highest peak, San Antonio Peak, 10,080 feet (3072 meters).
- saponification number — the number of milligrams of potassium hydroxide required to saponify one gram of a given ester, especially a glyceride.