16-letter words containing n, o, c, m
- as distinct from — If you say that you are talking about one thing as distinct from another, you are indicating exactly which thing you mean.
- atomic mass unit — a unit of mass used to express atomic and molecular weights that is equal to one twelfth of the mass of an atom of carbon-12. It is equivalent to 1.66 × 10–27 kg
- atwood's machine — a device consisting of two unequal masses connected by a string passed over a pulley, used to illustrate the laws of motion.
- automatrix, inc. — (company) The company which produced CAM-PC. Address: Ballston Spa, NY, USA.
- azodicarbonamide — (chemistry) An organic chemical, a yellow to orange red, odorless, crystalline powder, used in food industry as a food additive, a flour bleaching agent and improving agent and in foaming plastics.
- background music — music of any kind that is played while some other activity is going on, so that people do not actively attend to it
- backus-naur form — (language, grammar) (BNF, originally "Backus Normal Form") A formal metasyntax used to express context-free grammars. Backus Normal Form was renamed Backus-Naur Form at the suggestion of Donald Knuth. BNF is one of the most commonly used metasyntactic notations for specifying the syntax of programming languages, command sets, and the like. It is widely used for language descriptions but seldom documented anywhere (how do you document a metasyntax?), so that it must usually be learned by osmosis (but see RFC 2234). Consider this BNF for a US postal address:
::= ::= | "." ::= [ ] | ::= [ ] ::= "," This translates into English as: "A postal-address consists of a name-part, followed by a street-address part, followed by a zip-code part. A personal-part consists of either a first name or an initial followed by a dot. A name-part consists of either: a personal-part followed by a last name followed by an optional "jr-part" (Jr., Sr., or dynastic number) and end-of-line, or a personal part followed by a name part (this rule illustrates the use of recursion in BNFs, covering the case of people who use multiple first and middle names and/or initials). A street address consists of an optional apartment specifier, followed by a street number, followed by a street name. A zip-part consists of a town-name, followed by a comma, followed by a state code, followed by a ZIP-code followed by an end-of-line." Note that many things (such as the format of a personal-part, apartment specifier, or ZIP-code) are left unspecified. These lexical details are presumed to be obvious from context or specified somewhere nearby. There are many variants and extensions of BNF, possibly containing some or all of the regexp wild cards such as "*" or "+". EBNF is a common one. In fact the example above isn't the pure form invented for the ALGOL 60 report. "[]" was introduced a few years later in IBM's PL/I definition but is now universally recognised. ABNF is another extension. - badminton racket — the type of racket used in games of badminton
- ballroom dancing — Ballroom dancing is a type of dancing in which a man and a woman dance together using fixed sequences of steps and movements.
- baltimore canyon — a submarine valley cut into the continental shelf and slope seaward of Chesapeake Bay.
- barium carbonate — a white, poisonous, water-insoluble powder, BaCO 3 , used chiefly in the manufacture of rodenticides, paints, and dyes.
- 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.
- bathroom cabinet — a wall-mounted cabinet in a bathroom, typically with a mirror front and used for the storage of medicines and toiletries
- biomagnification — biological magnification.
- blink comparator — an optical instrument used to detect small differences in two photographs of the same field or object by viewing them alternately, switching rapidly from one to the other.
- blue mockingbird — any of several gray, black, and white songbirds of the genus Mimus, especially M. polyglottos, of the U.S. and Mexico, noted for their ability to mimic the songs of other birds.
- bombing campaign — a concerted, intensive and prolonged bombing of a target
- bonhomme richard — the flagship of John Paul Jones.
- boston cream pie — a cake of two layers with icing and a creamy filling
- bowman's capsule — a membranous, double-walled capsule surrounding a glomerulus of a nephron.
- brick-and-mortar — pertaining to conventional stores, businesses, etc., having physical buildings and facilities, as opposed to Internet or remote services.
- bronchial asthma — asthma.
- bronchopneumonia — inflammation of the lungs, originating in the bronchioles
- buckthorn family — the plant family Rhamnaceae, characterized by shrubs and trees having alternate, simple leaves, clusters of small flowers, and fruit in the form of a drupe or capsule, and including the buckthorn, cascara, and New Jersey tea.
- buoyancy chamber — an enclosed section of a canoe, float, ship or other object that contains air, foam, or another buoyant substance in order to help maintain buoyancy
- camborne-redruth — a former (until 1974) urban district in SW England, in Cornwall: formed in 1934 by the amalgamation of the neighbouring towns of Camborne and Redruth. Pop: 39 936 (2001)
- cameo appearance — a single and often brief dramatic scene played by a well-known actor or actress in a film or television play
- campagna di roma — low-lying plain in central Italy, around Rome: c. 800 sq mi (2,072 sq km)
- canada mayflower — a small wildflower (Maianthemum canadense) of the lily family, with white flowers and red, beadlike berries, found in the N U.S. and in Canada; bead-ruby
- canadian hemlock — eastern hemlock.
- capital movement — the payments that flow between countries
- capsizing moment — the moment of an upsetting couple.
- carnot's theorem — the principle that no engine operating between two given temperatures can be more efficient than a Carnot engine operating between the same temperatures.
- century meltdown — Year 2000
- chain of command — the various individual officers, ranks etc that constitute a hierarchy each level receiving orders from the one above it and passing on the orders to the one below
- chance one's arm — to attempt to do something although the chance of success may be slight
- chemical weapons — toxic chemicals used as weapons
- chemoluminescent — (chemistry) Exhibiting chemoluminescence.
- chemonucleolysis — treatment for a herniated spinal disk in which chymopapain is injected into the disk to dissolve tissue.
- chicken mushroom — an edible yellow-to-orange bracket fungus, Laetiporus sulphureus, common on tree trunks, in which it causes wood decay.
- chinese cinnamon — cassia (def 1).
- chinese primrose — any plant of the genus Primula, as P. vulgaris (English primrose) of Europe, having yellow flowers, or P. sinensis (Chinese primrose) of China, having flowers in a variety of colors. Compare primrose family.
- chlorinated lime — bleaching powder.
- chlorpheniramine — an antihistaminic compound, C 20 H 23 ClN 2 O 4 , used in treating the symptoms of allergies.
- cholera infantum — an often fatal form of gastroenteritis occurring in infants, not of the same cause as cholera but having somewhat similar characteristics.
- chorioamnionitis — Inflammation of the fetal membranes (amnion and chorion) due to a bacterial infection, most often associated with prolonged labour.
- choriomeningitis — (medicine) A form of cerebral meningitis associated with inflammation of the choroid plexus.
- chromatic number — (mathematics) The smallest number of colours necessary to colour the nodes of a graph so that no two adjacent nodes have the same colour. See also: four colour map theorem.
- chromium plating — plating, often for decorative effect, made of chromium
- chronic glaucoma — Ophthalmology. abnormally high fluid pressure in the eye, most commonly caused either by blockage of the channel through which aqueous humor drains (open-angle glaucoma or chronic glaucoma) or by pressure of the iris against the lens, which traps the aqueous humor (angle-closure glaucoma or acute glaucoma)