20-letter words containing k, e, r, a, t
- keep a straight face — look serious, avoid smiling
- keep a tight rein on — to control carefully; limit
- keratoconjunctivitis — inflammation of the cornea and conjunctiva.
- kick over the traces — either of the two straps, ropes, or chains by which a carriage, wagon, or the like is drawn by a harnessed horse or other draft animal.
- knight of the garter — a knight who belongs to the Order of the Garter
- knights hospitallers — a military religious order founded about the time of the first crusade (1096–99) among European crusaders. It took its name from a hospital and hostel in Jerusalem
- knock the tar out of — any of various dark-colored viscid products obtained by the destructive distillation of certain organic substances, as coal or wood.
- know all the answers — be opinionated
- kruger national park — a wildlife sanctuary in NE South Africa: the world's largest game reserve. Area: over 21 700 sq km (8400 sq miles)
- like a ton of bricks — (used esp of the manner of punishing or reprimanding someone) with great force; severely
- like death warmed up — very ill
- little kanawha river — a river in NW West Virginia, flowing N and NW to the Ohio River. 160 miles (257 km) long.
- make head (n)or tail — If you say that you cannot make head nor tail of something or you cannot make head or tail of it, you are emphasizing that you cannot understand it at all.
- make head or tail of — to attempt to understand (a problem, etc)
- make short shrift of — to dispose of quickly and unsympathetically
- marketing department — the department of a commercial organization that deals with the marketing of products
- megakaryocytopoiesis — (biology) The cellular development process that leads to platelet production.
- multistorey car park — a car park consisting of several levels
- near-market research — scientific research that, while not linked to the development of a specific product, is likely to be commercially exploitable
- network transparency — (networking) A feature of an operating system or other service which lets the user access a remote resource through a network without having to know if the resource is remote or local. For example NFS allow users to access remote files as if they were local files.
- neuromusculoskeletal — (medicine) Describing the interactions between nerves, muscles and the skeleton.
- nickel tetracarbonyl — nickel carbonyl.
- nikkei stock average — an index of prices on the Tokyo Stock Exchange
- off the beaten track — formed or shaped by blows; hammered: a dish of beaten brass.
- optical mark reading — the reading of marks by an optical device whereby the information can be stored in machine-readable form
- peak programme meter — an instrument for assessing the maximum levels of an electrical sound signal
- quaker meeting house — a place where Quakers gather for worship
- rattlesnake plantain — any of several low, terrestrial orchids, as Goodyera repens, of northern temperate regions, having a basal rosette of leaves with white veins and a one-sided spike of white flowers.
- regenerative braking — Regenerative braking is a form of braking in electric vehicles in which the loss of kinetic energy from braking is stored and then fed back later to provide power to the electric motor.
- registered trademark — brand name
- ring-necked parakeet — a small brightly coloured long-tailed tropical parrot, Psittacula krameri, often kept as a pet
- ring-necked pheasant — a gallinaceous Asian bird, Phasianus colchicus, having a white band around its neck, introduced into Great Britain, North America, and the Hawaiian Islands.
- rocky mountain sheep — bighorn.
- season ticket holder — a person who has a season ticket
- secure sockets layer — (networking, security) (SSL) A protocol designed by Netscape Communications Corporation to provide secure communications over the Internet using asymmetric key encryption. SSL is layered beneath application protocols such as HTTP, SMTP, Telnet, FTP, Gopher and NNTP and is layered above the connection protocol TCP/IP. It is used by the HTTPS access method.
- shakespearean sonnet — a sonnet form used by Shakespeare and having the rhyme scheme abab, cdcd, efef, gg.
- short back and sides — If a man has a short back and sides, his hair is cut very short at the back and sides with slightly thicker, longer hair on the top of the head.
- snowflake generation — the generation of people who became adults in the 2010s, viewed as being less resilient and more prone to taking offence than previous generations
- south orkney islands — an uninhabited group of islands in the S Atlantic, southeast of Cape Horn: formerly a dependency of the Falkland Islands; part of the British Antarctic Territory since 1962 (claims are suspended under the Antarctic Treaty). Area: 621 sq km (240 sq miles)
- standard book number — International Standard Book Number. Abbreviation: SBN.
- storage area network — (storage) (SAN) A high-speed subnetwork of shared storage devices. A storage device is a machine that contains nothing but a disk or disks for storing data. A SAN's architecture works in a way that makes all storage devices available to all servers on a LAN or WAN. As more storage devices are added to a SAN, they too will be accessible from any server in the larger network. The server merely acts as a pathway between the end user and the stored data. Because stored data does not reside directly on any of a network's servers, server power is used for business applications, and network capacity is released to the end user.
- synchronized skating — the art or sport of teams of up to twenty skaters holding onto each other and moving in patterns in time to music
- take to the cleaners — a person who cleans, especially one whose regular occupation is cleaning offices, buildings, equipment, etc.
- the luck of the draw — If you say that something is the luck of the draw, you mean that it is the result of chance and you cannot do anything about it.
- there's no mistaking — You can say there is no mistaking something when you are emphasizing that you cannot fail to recognize or understand it.
- to be walking on air — If you say that you are walking on air or floating on air, you mean that you feel extremely happy about something.
- to get your own back — If you get your own back on someone, you have your revenge on them because of something bad that they have done to you.
- to keep your balance — If you keep your balance, for example, when standing in a moving vehicle, you remain steady and do not fall over. If you lose your balance, you become unsteady and fall over.
- to keep your hand in — If you do something to keep your hand in, you practise a skill or hobby occasionally in order to remain fairly good at it.
- to leave your/a mark — If someone or something leaves their mark or leaves a mark, they have a lasting effect on another person or thing.