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20-letter words containing l, u, r, e

  • boulogne-billancourt — an industrial suburb of SW Paris. Pop: 106 367 (1999)
  • bouvier des flandres — any of a breed of large, strong dog with a rough, wiry coat and pointed, erect ears
  • british thermal unit — a unit of heat in the fps system equal to the quantity of heat required to raise the temperature of 1 pound of water by 1°F. 1 British thermal unit is equivalent to 1055.06 joules or 251.997 calories
  • brown lung (disease) — a chronic disease of the lungs caused by inhalation of fine textile fibers, esp. cotton; byssinosis
  • brown recluse spider — a very poisonous, medium-sized spider (Loxosceles reclusa), common in the U.S., having a violin-shaped mark on its cephalothorax and only six eyes
  • buckminsterfullerene — a form of carbon that contains molecules having 60 carbon atoms arranged at the vertices of a polyhedron with hexagonal and pentagonal faces. It is produced in carbon arcs and occurs naturally in small amounts in certain minerals
  • butterfly-shell clam — coquina.
  • calcium hypochlorite — a white, crystalline compound, Ca(OCl) 2 , used as a disinfectant and bleaching agent.
  • calcium permanganate — a violet, crystalline, deliquescent solid, Ca(MnO 4) 2 ⋅4H 2 O, used chiefly as a disinfectant and deodorizer.
  • calculus of pleasure — (in utilitarianism) appraisal of possible alternative choices in terms of the amount of pleasure to be gained and pain to be avoided in each.
  • call-by-value-result — An argument passing convention where the actual argument is a variable V whose value is copied to a local variable L inside the called function or procedure. If the procedure modifies L, these changes will not affect V, which may also be in scope inside the procedure, until the procedure returns when the final value of L is copied to V. Under call-by-reference changes to L would affect V immediately. Used, for example, by BBC BASIC V on the Acorn Archimedes.
  • card up one's sleeve — a plan or resource kept secret or held in reserve
  • carl friedrich gauss — (person)   A German mathematician (1777 - 1855), one of all time greatest. Gauss discovered the method of least squares and Gaussian elimination. Gauss was something of a child prodigy; the most commonly told story relates that when he was 10 his teacher, wanting a rest, told his class to add up all the numbers from 1 to 100. Gauss did it in seconds, having noticed that 1+...+100 = 100+...+1 = (101+...+101)/2. He did important work in almost every area of mathematics. Such eclecticism is probably impossible today, since further progress in most areas of mathematics requires much hard background study. Some idea of the range of his work can be obtained by noting the many mathematical terms with "Gauss" in their names. E.g. Gaussian elimination (linear algebra); Gaussian primes (number theory); Gaussian distribution (statistics); Gauss [unit] (electromagnetism); Gaussian curvature (differential geometry); Gaussian quadrature (numerical analysis); Gauss-Bonnet formula (differential geometry); Gauss's identity (hypergeometric functions); Gauss sums (number theory). His favourite area of mathematics was number theory. He conjectured the Prime Number Theorem, pioneered the theory of quadratic forms, proved the quadratic reciprocity theorem, and much more. He was "the first mathematician to use complex numbers in a really confident and scientific way" (Hardy & Wright, chapter 12). He nearly went into architecture rather than mathematics; what decided him on mathematics was his proof, at age 18, of the startling theorem that a regular N-sided polygon can be constructed with ruler and compasses if and only if N is a power of 2 times a product of distinct Fermat primes.
  • catastrophic failure — Catastrophic failure is sudden and complete failure which cannot be put right.
  • cavalleria rusticana — an opera (1890) by Pietro Mascagni.
  • cellular respiration — the oxidation of organic compounds that occurs within cells, producing energy for cellular processes.
  • cellulose triacetate — a triacetic ester of cellulose characterized by its resistance to most solvents, used chiefly in the manufacture of textile fibers.
  • centrifugal spinning — the spinning of rayon filaments in a centrifugal box.
  • channel service unit — (communications)   (CSU) A type of interface used to connect a terminal or computer to a digital medium in the same way that a modem is used for connection to an analogue medium. A CSU is provided by the communication carrier to customers who wish to use their own equipment to retime and regenerate the incoming signals. The customer must supply all of the transmit logic, receive logic and timing recovery in order to use the CSU, whereas a digital service unit DSU performs these functions.
  • checkbook journalism — the practice of paying for a news story or an interview, or for exclusive broadcasting or publishing rights.
  • chemolithoautotrophs — Plural form of chemolithoautotroph.
  • chemotherapeutically — By means of chemotherapy.
  • child support agency — the British government agency concerned with the welfare of children
  • child-abuse register — (in Britain) a list of children deemed to be at risk of abuse or injury from their parents or guardians, compiled and held by a local authority, area health authority, or NSPCC Special Unit
  • christopher columbus — Christopher (Sp. Cristóbal Colón; It. Cristoforo Colombo) 1446?–1506, Italian navigator in Spanish service: traditionally considered the discoverer of America 1492.
  • clear air turbulence — turbulent air, not associated with a storm, that affects the flight of aircraft
  • clear-air turbulence — atmospheric turbulence, sometimes severe, occurring in air devoid of clouds or other visible indicators that turbulence might be present. Abbreviation: CAT.
  • clothes manufacturer — a business concern that manufactures clothes
  • colorado blue spruce — blue spruce.
  • colour look-up table — colour palette
  • compensation culture — a culture in which people are very ready to go to law over even relatively minor incidents in the hope of gaining compensation
  • complaints procedure — a prescribed method of lodging a complaint to an institution
  • complementary colour — one of any pair of colours, such as yellow and blue, that give white or grey when mixed in the correct proportions
  • computability theory — (mathematics)   The area of theoretical computer science concerning what problems can be solved by any computer. A function is computable if an algorithm can be implemented which will give the correct output for any valid input. Since computer programs are countable but real numbers are not, it follows that there must exist real numbers that cannot be calculated by any program. Unfortunately, by definition, there isn't an easy way of describing any of them! In fact, there are many tasks (not just calculating real numbers) that computers cannot perform. The most well-known is the halting problem, the busy beaver problem is less famous but just as fascinating.
  • consumer electronics — computers and other electronic devices designed for private individuals as opposed to businesses
  • controlled substance — a drug regulated by the Federal Controlled Substances Acts, including opiates, depressants, stimulants, and hallucinogens
  • convergent evolution — the evolutionary development of a superficial resemblance between unrelated animals that occupy a similar environment, as in the evolution of wings in birds and bats
  • convertible currency — A convertible currency is a currency that can be bought and sold on the open market for other currencies.
  • council of ministers — the EU's most important decision-making body
  • council of the reich — the Reichsrat.
  • council-manager plan — (in the US) a system of local government with an elected legislative council and an appointed administrative manager
  • counter-inflationary — designed to reduce inflation
  • counter-intelligence — Counter-intelligence consists of actions that a country takes in order to find out whether another country is spying on it and to prevent it from doing so.
  • counterproliferation — Action intended to prevent an increase or spread in the possession of nuclear weapons.
  • counterrevolutionary — Counterrevolutionary activities are activities intended to reverse the effects of a previous revolution.
  • counterrevolutionist — A counterrevolutionary.
  • court of last resort — (in the US) a supreme court
  • critical temperature — the temperature of a substance in its critical state. A gas can only be liquefied by pressure alone at temperatures below its critical temperature
  • crude oil evaluation — Crude oil evaluation is the process of assessing the chemical and physical properties of crude oil, against particular standards.
  • de la madrid hurtado — Miguel [mee-gel] /miˈgɛl/ (Show IPA), 1934–2012, Mexican political leader: president 1982–88.
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