16-letter words containing i, d, u, m, a
- dinosaurs mating — (humour) The activity said to occur when yet another big iron merger or buy-out occurs; reflects a perception by hackers that these signal another stage in the long, slow dying of the mainframe industry. Also described as "elephants mating": lots of noise and action at a high level, with an eventual outcome in the somewhat distant future. In its glory days of the 1960s, it was "IBM and the Seven Dwarves": Burroughs, Control Data, General Electric, Honeywell, NCR, RCA, and Univac. Early on, RCA sold out to Univac and GE also sold out, and it was "IBM and the BUNCH" (an acronym for Burroughs, Univac, NCR, Control Data, and Honeywell) for a while. Honeywell was bought out by Bull. Univac in turn merged with Sperry to form Sperry/Univac, which was later merged (although the employees of Sperry called it a hostile takeover) with Burroughs to form Unisys in 1986 (this was when the phrase "dinosaurs mating" was coined). In 1991 AT&T absorbed NCR, only to spit it out again in 1996. Unisys bought Convergent Technologies in 1988 and later others. More such earth-shaking unions of doomed giants seem inevitable.
- diplomatic pouch — a sealed mailbag containing diplomatic correspondence that is sent free of inspection between a foreign office and its diplomatic or consular post abroad or from one such post to another.
- discombobulating — Present participle of discombobulate.
- discombobulation — to confuse or disconcert; upset; frustrate: The speaker was completely discombobulated by the hecklers.
- distance modulus — a measure of the distance, r, of a celestial object too far away to show measurable parallax. It is given by m–M = 5 log(r/10), where m is its apparent magnitude (corrected for interstellar absorption) and M is its absolute magnitude
- document imaging — the process of converting paper documents into an electronic or digital format
- documentary film — factual, informative film
- double pneumonia — pneumonia affecting both lungs.
- drumhead service — a religious service attended by members of a military unit while in the field
- duchess of malfi — a tragedy (1614?) by John Webster.
- duplessis-mornay — Philippe [fee-leep] /fiˈlip/ (Show IPA), Mornay, Philippe de.
- dynamic language — (language) (Dylan) A simple object-oriented Lisp dialect, most closely resembling CLOS and Scheme, developed by Advanced Technology Group East at Apple Computer. See also Marlais.
- enriched uranium — uranium in which the proportion of the fissile isotope U-235 has been increased to make it more fissile
- exhaust manifold — An exhaust manifold is a heat-resistant tube that connects an engine to an exhaust pipe.
- exhumation order — a legal instruction to exhume a body
- four-dimensional — of a space having points, or a set having elements, which require four coordinates for their unique determination.
- four-masted brig — jackass bark (def 2).
- fundamental unit — one of a set of unrelated units that form the basis of a system of units. For example, the metre, kilogram, and second are fundamental units of the SI system
- fundamentalistic — Fundamentalist.
- gallium arsenide — a crystalline and highly toxic semiconductor, GaAs, used in light-emitting diodes, lasers, and electronic devices.
- gaudeamus igitur — let us therefore rejoice
- gingerbread plum — a tree, Neocarya macrophylla, of western Africa, bearing a large, edible, starchy fruit.
- headhunting firm — a recruiting agency
- housemaid's knee — inflammation of the bursa over the front of the kneecap.
- huffman encoding — Huffman coding
- hydrated alumina — a crystalline, water-insoluble powder, Al(OH) 3 or Al 2 O 3 ⋅3H 2 O, obtained chiefly from bauxite: used in the manufacture of glass, ceramics, and printing inks, in dyeing, and in medicine as an antacid and in the treatment of ulcers.
- hydration number — the number of molecules of water with which an ion can combine in an aqueous solution of given concentration.
- hydraulic cement — cement that can solidify under water.
- hydraulic mining — placer mining using a pressurized stream of water.
- hydroxylammonium — (inorganic compound) The univalent NH3OH+ cation, derived from hydroxylamine.
- immunodepressant — preventing or diminishing the immune response
- immunomodulation — Any of several adjustments in the level of an immune response.
- immunomodulatory — (medical) Having the ability to alter or regulate immune functions.
- incidental music — music intended primarily to point up or accompany parts of the action of a play or to serve as transitional material between scenes.
- indemnity clause — a clause in a contract that commits one or both parties to indemnify any loss that arises out of the contract
- kingdom-of-nubia — a region in S Egypt and the Sudan, N of Khartoum, extending from the Nile to the Red Sea.
- kiss and make up — be reconciled
- latissimus dorsi — a broad, flat muscle on each side of the midback, the action of which draws the arm backward and downward and rotates the front of the arm toward the body.
- liturgical drama — medieval drama, based on incidents in the Bible and performed in churches on holy days, usually in Latin and often chanted.
- machine moulding — the process of making moulds and cores for castings by mechanical means, usually by compacting the moulding sand by vibration instead of by ramming down
- magellanic cloud — either of two irregular galactic clusters in the southern heavens that are the nearest independent star system to the Milky Way.
- mahmud of ghazni — a.d. 971?–1030, Muslim Amir of Ghazni 997–1030.
- mail-order house — a retail firm that conducts its business by receiving orders and shipping its merchandise through the mail and that supplies its customers with catalogs, circulars, etc.
- malicious damage — Malicious damage is damage caused on purpose to the property of another person.
- married quarters — the housing provided on a military base for married servicemen or servicewomen
- masculine ending — a final inflection or suffix designating that a word belongs to the masculine gender.
- mass destruction — devastation on a large scale
- measuring device — gauge
- medieval studies — a course of study based on the history of the Middle Ages
- medium artillery — guns and howitzers of more than 105mm and less than 155mm caliber, sometimes including the 155mm howitzers. Compare heavy artillery (def 2), light artillery (def 2).