16-letter words containing l, p, s
- banana republics — any of the small countries in the tropics, especially in the Western Hemisphere, whose economies are largely dependent on fruit exports, tourism, and foreign investors.
- band-pass filter — a filter that transmits only those currents having a frequency lying within specified limits
- basement complex — the undifferentiated assemblage of rock (basement rock) underlying the oldest stratified rocks in any region: usually crystalline, metamorphosed, and mostly, but not necessarily, Precambrian in age.
- bashkir republic — a constituent republic of E central Russia, in the S Urals: established as the first Soviet autonomous republic in 1919; rich mineral resources. Capital: Ufa. Pop: 4 012 900 (2002). Area: 143 600 sq km (55 430 sq miles)
- bearing pedestal — an independent support for a bearing, usually incorporating a bearing housing
- belgian sheepdog — any of a Belgian breed of large herding dog with a black coat, sometimes used as a guide dog
- bicapitalisation — The act said to have been performed on trademarks (such as PostScript, NeXT, NeWS, VisiCalc, FrameMaker, TK!solver, EasyWriter) that have been raised above the ruck of common coinage by nonstandard capitalisation. Too many marketroid types think this sort of thing is really cute, even the 2,317th time they do it. Compare studlycaps.
- bimetallic strip — a strip consisting of two metals of different coefficients of expansion welded together so that it buckles on heating: used in thermostats, etc
- bipolar disorder — Bipolar disorder is a mental illness in which a person's state of mind changes between extreme happiness and extreme depression.
- bird's-eye maple — a cut of sugar maple wood used especially for veneers, having a wavy grain with many dark, circular markings.
- blenheim spaniel — a variety of toy spaniel that is white with reddish-brown spots
- bloomsbury group — a group of writers, artists, and intellectuals living and working in and around Bloomsbury in London from about 1907 to 1930. Influenced by the philosophy of G. E. Moore, they included Leonard and Virginia Woolf, Clive and Vanessa Bell, Roger Fry, E. M. Forster, Lytton Strachey, Duncan Grant, and John Maynard Keynes
- bootstrap loader — (operating system) A short program loaded from non-volatile storage and used to bootstrap a computer. On early computers great efforts were expended on making the bootstrap loader short, in order to make it easy to toggle in via the front panel switches. It was just clever enough to read in a slightly more complex program (usually from punched cards or paper tape), to which it handed control. This program in turn read the application or operating system from a magnetic tape drive or disk drive. Thus, in successive steps, the computer "pulled itself up by its bootstraps" to a useful operating state. Nowadays the bootstrap loader is usually found in ROM or EPROM, and reads the first stage in from a fixed location on the disk, called the "boot block". When this program gains control, it is powerful enough to load the actual OS and hand control over to it. A diskless workstation can use bootp to load its OS from the network.
- bouquet larkspur — a plant, Delphinium grandiflorum, of eastern Asia, having blue or whitish flowers and hairy fruit.
- bowman's capsule — a membranous, double-walled capsule surrounding a glomerulus of a nephron.
- bristlecone pine — a coniferous tree, Pinus aristata, of the western US, bearing cones with bristle-like prickles: one of the longest-lived trees, useful in radiocarbon dating
- brittany spaniel — a short-tailed French bird dog that typically has a smooth orange- or liver-and-white coat
- brothel-creepers — soft-soled men's shoes that were originally popular in the 1950s
- bulletproof vest — a protective garment
- button one's lip — to stop talking: often imperative
- cadmium sulphide — an orange or yellow insoluble solid used as a pigment in paints, etc (cadmium yellow). Formula: CdS
- camomile shampoo — a liquid or cream preparation of soap or detergent with camomile extract to wash the hair
- capital reserves — the money which a company holds in reserve
- capital sentence — the punishment of death for a crime
- capitalistically — In a capitalistic manner.
- capsule wardrobe — a collection of clothes and accessories that includes only items considered essential
- carbonless paper — a sheet of paper impregnated with dye which transfers writing or typing onto the copying surface below without the necessity for carbon pigment
- caryophyllaceous — of, relating to, or belonging to the Caryophyllaceae, a family of flowering plants including the pink, carnation, sweet william, and chickweed
- cascade particle — the least massive member of the xi particle family.
- castor-oil plant — a tall euphorbiaceous Indian plant, Ricinus communis, cultivated in tropical regions for ornament and for its poisonous seeds, from which castor oil is extracted
- catastrophically — of the nature of a catastrophe, or disastrous event; calamitous: a catastrophic failure of the dam.
- celestial empire — Chinese Empire
- celestial sphere — an imaginary sphere of infinitely large radius enclosing the universe so that all celestial bodies appear to be projected onto its surface
- chattel personal — an item of movable personal property, such as furniture, domestic animals, etc
- chemical weapons — toxic chemicals used as weapons
- chemolithotrophs — Plural form of chemolithotroph.
- chemoprophylaxis — the prevention of disease using chemical drugs
- chest specialist — a physician who specializes in diseases affecting the organs in the chest
- child psychiatry — the branch of psychiatry specializing in the treatment of children.
- child psychology — the study of the mental states and processes of children.
- children's panel — (in Scotland) a group of representatives of relevant agencies, with the power to deal with a child under sixteen who is in criminal or family trouble. Its hearings are private and replace most of the functions of juvenile courts
- chinese fan palm — a fan palm, Livistona chinensis, of southern Japan, having very large, deeply cleft leaves and bluish-green, ovalish fruit.
- chinese pavilion — crescent (def 6).
- chinese-pavilion — a shape resembling a segment of a ring tapering to points at the ends.
- cholecystography — radiography of the gall bladder after administration of a contrast medium
- chondrodysplasia — (medicine) A genetic disorder characterized by short-limbed dwarfism.
- chryselephantine — (of ancient Greek statues) made of or overlaid with gold and ivory
- chuvash republic — a constituent republic of W central Russia, in the middle Volga valley: generally low-lying with undulating plains and large areas of forest. Capital: Cheboksary. Pop: 1 313 900 (2002). Area: 18 300 sq km (7064 sq miles)
- circumscriptible — Capable of being circumscribed or limited by bounds.
- clearance-papers — the act of clearing.