18-letter words containing o, b, n
- bargaining counter — A bargaining counter is the same as a bargaining chip.
- baritone saxophone — the second lowest instrument in the family of saxophones
- barrow's goldeneye — See under goldeneye (def 1).
- bartholin's glands — two small reddish-yellow glands, one on each side of the vaginal orifice, that secrete a mucous lubricating substance during sexual stimulation in females
- basal conglomerate — a conglomerate deposited on an erosion surface and constituting the bottom layer of a stratigraphic series.
- battery eliminator — eliminator (def 2).
- battery-eliminator — a person or thing that eliminates.
- battle of clontarf — a battle fought in 1014, near Dublin, in the Republic of Ireland, in which the Danes were defeated by the Irish but the Irish king, Brian Boru, was killed
- battle of omdurman — a battle (1898) in which the Mahdi's successor and his Ansar followers were defeated by Lord Kitchener's British forces
- battleground-state — a state of the U.S. in which the Democratic and Republican candidates both have a good chance of winning and that is considered key to the outcome of a presidential election: the swing states of Ohio and Indiana.
- be full of oneself — If you say to someone 'you're full of yourself', you disapprove of them because they appear very pleased with themselves, thinking that they are very clever, special, or important.
- be getting nowhere — If you say that you are getting nowhere, or getting nowhere fast, or that something is getting you nowhere, you mean that you are not achieving anything or having any success.
- be having a moment — If something or someone is having a moment, they are successful or popular at the present time.
- be in good company — If you say that someone is in good company, you mean that they should not be ashamed of a mistake or opinion, because some important or respected people have made the same mistake or have the same opinion.
- be lost in thought — If you are lost in thought, you give all your attention to what you are thinking about and do not notice what is going on around you.
- be lost on someone — If advice or a comment is lost on someone, they do not understand it or they pay no attention to it.
- be sure of oneself — If you are sure of yourself, you are very confident about your own abilities or opinions.
- beaujolais nouveau — the first Beaujolais wine of the season, usually available for sale within two months after the grapes are harvested.
- beauty competition — a competition in which the participants, usually women, are judged on their attractiveness, with a prize, and often a title, awarded to the winner
- bedlington terrier — a lithe, graceful breed of terrier having a long tapering head with no stop and a thick fleecy coat
- before the present — See B.P (def 4).
- before you know it — rapidly, soon
- beg on bended knee — to ask someone for something very seriously
- beggar-my-neighbor — beggar-your-neighbor.
- behavioral science — any of several studies, as sociology, psychology, anthropology, etc., that examine human activities in an attempt to discover recurrent patterns and to formulate rules about social behavior
- behaviour patterns — the characteristic ways in which a person or animal acts
- bel and the dragon — a book of the Apocrypha that is included as chapter 14 of Daniel in the Douay Bible.
- benchmark position — a public service job used for comparison with a similar position, such as a position in commerce, for wage settlements
- bend over backward — to try to an unusual degree (to please, pacify, etc.)
- bend someone's ear — to speak at length to an unwilling listener, esp to voice one's troubles
- benzyl thiocyanate — a colorless, crystalline, water-insoluble solid, C 8 H 7 NS, used as an insecticide.
- bernard montgomery — Bernard Law, 1st Viscount Montgomery of Alamein ("Monty") 1887–1976, British field marshal: World War II commander of British 8th Army in Africa and Europe.
- bernard of menthon — Saint(11th cent.); Fr. monk who founded hospices in the Swiss Alps: his day is May 28
- bernoulli equation — Hydrodynamics. Bernoulli's theorem (def 2).
- berwick-upon-tweed — a town in N England, in N Northumberland at the mouth of the Tweed: much involved in border disputes between England and Scotland between the 12th and 16th centuries; neutral territory 1551–1885. Pop: 12 870 (2001)
- bessemer converter — a refractory-lined furnace used to convert pig iron into steel by the Bessemer process
- between you and me — in the space separating (two points, objects, etc.): between New York and Chicago.
- beyond one's depth — in water deeper than one is tall
- bill of indictment — a formal document accusing a person or persons of crime, formerly presented to a grand jury for certification as a true bill but now signed by a court official
- bill of quantities — a document drawn up by a quantity surveyor providing details of the prices, dimensions, etc, of the materials required to build a large structure, such as a factory
- biodiversification — the process by which the diversity of plants or animals develops or is increased within a particular region or group of organisms.
- bioinstrumentation — the use of instruments, as sensors, to detect and measure certain body functions, as of persons in spaceflight, and transmit the data to a point where it is evaluated
- biological control — the control of destructive organisms by the use of other organisms, such as the natural predators of the pests
- biological parents — the biological mother and father of a child
- bipolar transistor — (electronics) A transistor made from a sandwich of n- and p-type semiconductor material: either npn or pnp. The middle section is known as the "base" and the other two as the "collector" and "emitter". When used as an amplifying element, the base to emitter junction is in a "forward-biased" (conducting) condition, and the base to collector junction is "reverse-biased" or non-conducting. Small changes in the base to emitter current (the input signal) cause either holes (for pnp devices) or free electrons (for npn) to enter the base from the emitter. The attracting voltage of the collector causes the majority of these charges to cross into and be collected by the collector, resulting in amplification. Contrast field effect transistor.
- bird's-nest orchid — a brown parasitic Eurasian orchid, Neottia nidus-avis, whose thick fleshy roots resemble a bird's nest and contain a fungus on which the orchid feeds
- birth control pill — an oral contraceptive for women, containing the hormones estrogen and progesterone or progesterone alone, that inhibits ovulation, fertilization, or implantation of a fertilized ovum, causing temporary infertility.
- birth-control pill — an oral contraceptive for women, containing the hormones estrogen and progesterone or progesterone alone, that inhibits ovulation, fertilization, or implantation of a fertilized ovum, causing temporary infertility.
- bitwise complement — The bitwise complement of a bit field is a bit field of the same length but with each zero changed to a one and vice versa. This is the same as the ones complement of a binary integer.
- black nickel oxide — a gray-black, water-insoluble powder, Ni 2 O 3 , which, at 600°C, decomposes to nickel oxide: used chiefly in storage batteries as an oxidizing agent.