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17-letter words containing o, n, h

  • hawking radiation — the emission of particles by a black hole. Pairs of virtual particles in the intense gravitational field around a black hole may live long enough for one to move outward when the other is pulled into the black hole, making it appear that the black hole is emitting radiation
  • heart of darkness — a short novel (1902) by Joseph Conrad.
  • heat of formation — the heat evolved or absorbed when one mole of a compound is formed from its constituent atoms
  • heavy mineral oil — a colorless, oily, almost tasteless, water-insoluble liquid, usually of either a standard light density (light mineral oil) or a standard heavy density (heavy mineral oil) consisting of mixtures of hydrocarbons obtained from petroleum by distillation: used chiefly as a lubricant, in the manufacture of cosmetics, and in medicine as a laxative.
  • helen keller mode — 1. State of a hardware or software system that is deaf, dumb, and blind, i.e. accepting no input and generating no output, usually due to an infinite loop or some other excursion into deep space. (Unfair to the real Helen Keller, whose success at learning speech was triumphant.) See also go flatline, catatonic. 2. On IBM PCs under MS-DOS, refers to a specific failure mode in which a screen saver has kicked in over an ill-behaved application which bypasses the very interrupts the screen saver watches for activity. Your choices are to try to get from the program's current state through a successful save-and-exit without being able to see what you're doing, or to re-boot the machine. This isn't (strictly speaking) a crash.
  • helicopter parent — a style of child rearing in which an overprotective mother or father discourages a child's independence by being too involved in the child's life: In typical helicopter parenting, a mother or father swoops in at any sign of challenge or discomfort.
  • hemoconcentration — an increase in the concentration of cellular elements in the blood, resulting from loss of plasma.
  • henry cabot lodge — Henry Cabot, 1850–1924, U.S. public servant and author: senator 1893–1924.
  • henry of portugal — ("the Navigator") 1394–1460, prince of Portugal: sponsor of geographic explorations.
  • heptanedioic acid — pimelic acid.
  • heteronormativity — The view that all human beings are either male or female, both in sex and in gender, and that sexual and romantic thoughts and relations are normal only when between people of different sexes.
  • hexacosanoic acid — cerotic acid.
  • hexadecanoic acid — palmitic acid.
  • high commissioner — a representative of one sovereign member of the Commonwealth of Nations in the country of another, having a rank and responsibilities generally similar to those of an ambassador.
  • high-carbon steel — steel containing between 0.5 and 1.5 per cent carbon
  • hillel foundation — a national organization, founded in 1924 by the B'nai B'rith, that institutes and administers programs designed to enrich the religious, cultural, and social life of Jewish college students.
  • histamine blocker — any of various substances that act at a specific receptor site to block certain actions of histamine.
  • ho chi minh trail — a network of jungle paths winding from North Vietnam through Laos and Cambodia into South Vietnam, used as a military route by North Vietnam to supply the Vietcong during the Vietnam War.
  • hoare powerdomain — powerdomain
  • hodgkin's disease — a type of cancer characterized by progressive chronic inflammation and enlargement of the lymph nodes of the neck, armpit, groin, and mesentery, by enlargement of the spleen and occasionally of the liver and the kidneys, and by lymphoid infiltration along the blood vessels.
  • hold one's breath — If you say that someone is holding their breath, you mean that they are waiting anxiously or excitedly for something to happen.
  • hold one's end up — the last part or extremity, lengthwise, of anything that is longer than it is wide or broad: the end of a street; the end of a rope.
  • hold one's ground — the solid surface of the earth; firm or dry land: to fall to the ground.
  • hold one's horses — a large, solid-hoofed, herbivorous quadruped, Equus caballus, domesticated since prehistoric times, bred in a number of varieties, and used for carrying or pulling loads, for riding, and for racing.
  • hold one's tongue — Anatomy. the usually movable organ in the floor of the mouth in humans and most vertebrates, functioning in eating, in tasting, and, in humans, in speaking.
  • hold sb to ransom — If you say that someone is holding you to ransom in British English, or holding you for ransom in American English, you mean that they are using their power to try to force you to do something which you do not want to do.
  • holding operation — a plan or procedure devised to prolong the existing situation
  • hole in the heart — a defect of the heart in which there is an abnormal opening in any of the walls dividing the four heart chambers
  • holistic medicine — incorporating the concept of holism, or the idea that the whole is more than merely the sum of its parts, in theory or practice: holistic psychology.
  • hollandaise sauce — a sauce of egg yolks, butter, lemon juice, and seasonings.
  • hollerith, herman — Herman Hollerith
  • holy roman empire — a Germanic empire located chiefly in central Europe that began with the coronation of Charlemagne as Roman emperor in a.d. 800 (or, according to some historians, with the coronation of Otto the Great, king of Germany, in a.d. 962) and ended with the renunciation of the Roman imperial title by Francis II in 1806, and was regarded theoretically as the continuation of the Western Empire and as the temporal form of a universal dominion whose spiritual head was the pope.
  • home improvements — improvements to one's home, such as new kitchens and bathrooms, central heating etc
  • homeland security — national defence
  • homo floresiensis — a possible species of very small, primitive human: its fossils were discovered on the Indonesian island of Flores in 2003.
  • homogentisic acid — an intermediate compound in the metabolism of tyrosine and of phenylalanine, found in excess in the blood and urine of persons affected with alkaptonuria.
  • homolytic fission — the dissociation of a molecule into two neutral fragments
  • homovanillic acid — the end product of dopamine metabolism, C 9 H 10 O 4 , found in human urine.
  • honorable mention — a citation conferred on a contestant, exhibit, etc., having exceptional merit though not winning a top honor or prize.
  • hope against hope — the feeling that what is wanted can be had or that events will turn out for the best: to give up hope.
  • horatio kitchener — Horatio Herbert (1st Earl Kitchener of Khartoum and of Broome) 1850–1916, English field marshal and statesman.
  • hormone treatment — any of several medical treatments using hormones
  • hornblende schist — a variety of schist containing needles of hornblende that lie in parallel planes.
  • horst wessel song — the official song of the Nazi party in Germany from 1933 to 1945.
  • hospital gangrene — Pathology. a contagious, often fatal gangrene, especially involving amputation stumps and war wounds, occurring usually in crowded, ill-kept hospitals, and caused by putrefactive bacteria.
  • hot on sb's heels — If you say that someone is hot on your heels, you are emphasizing that they are chasing you and are not very far behind you.
  • hot-and-sour soup — a spicy Chinese soup made with pork, chicken, beans, vinegar, etc., served hot
  • hottentot's bread — elephant's-foot.
  • houndstooth check — a pattern of broken checks, used in woven material for jackets, shirts, etc.
  • household ammonia — diluted ammonia, often having a small quantity of detergent, used in the home for cleaning.
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