20-letter words containing o, p, a, c
- capitation allowance — an amount of money given to a school based on the number of students it has
- carbocyclic compound — any of a group of organic chemical compounds in which all the atoms composing the ring are carbon atoms, as benzene or cyclopropane.
- card up one's sleeve — a plan or resource kept secret or held in reserve
- carpathian mountains — a mountain system of central and E Europe, extending from Slovakia to central Romania: mainly forested, with rich iron ore resources. Highest peak: Gerlachovka, 2663 m (8788 ft)
- cassegrain telescope — an astronomical reflecting telescope in which incident light is reflected from a large concave paraboloid mirror onto a smaller convex hyperboloid mirror and then back through a hole in the concave mirror to form the image
- cast a pall over sth — If something unpleasant casts a pall over an event or occasion, it makes it less enjoyable than it should be.
- catastrophic failure — Catastrophic failure is sudden and complete failure which cannot be put right.
- catastrophic illness — A catastrophic illness is a major health event that takes place during a particular period of time, such as a heart attack, stroke, or cancer.
- cellular respiration — the oxidation of organic compounds that occurs within cells, producing energy for cellular processes.
- châlons-en-champagne — a town in NE France, on the River Marne: scene of Attila's defeat by the Romans (451 ad). Pop: 47 339 (1999)
- change-speed gearbox — A change-speed gearbox is a set of movable or constant gears which allows the speed ratio between input and output shafts to be changed either manually or automatically.
- chapter of accidents — a series of misfortunes
- character repertoire — (character) The set of all characters onto which a coded character set maps integers (code positions). For example, consider these two simple coded character sets: Coded Character Set One: integer 0 -> the character "A" integer 1 -> the character "B" Coded Character Set Two: integer 0 -> the character "B" integer 1 -> the character "A" Both of these coded character sets map to the characters "A" and "B", so they have the same character repertoire. But since the mapping is different (and obviously incompatible), these are different coded character sets.
- chebyshev polynomial — a polynomial solution of the Tchebycheff equation, of the form T n (x) = cos(n cos −1 x), where n is an integer.
- checkerboard pattern — checked pattern that looks like a draughtboard
- chemolithoautotrophs — Plural form of chemolithoautotroph.
- chemotherapeutically — By means of chemotherapy.
- child support agency — the British government agency concerned with the welfare of children
- christopher strachey — (person) Professor of Computation at Oxford, England, born 1916, died May 1975. He invented the term "currying". See also: General Purpose Macro-generator.
- chromatic adaptation — the alteration by photosynthesizing organisms of the proportions of their photosynthetic pigments in response to the intensity and colour of the available light, as shown by algae in the littoral zone, which change from green to red as the zone is descended
- clay-colored sparrow — a sparrow, Spizella pallida, of the interior of North America, having buff, brown, and white plumage with a pale-gray breast.
- clay-pigeon shooting — the activity of shooting clay pigeons
- co-operative society — In Britain, a co-operative society is a commercial organization with several shops in a particular district. Customers can join this organization and get a share of its profits.
- cold-weather payment — (in Britain) a payment made by the government to people on low incomes when the temperature falls below a certain level for a specific number of days
- colloidal suspension — a mixture having particles of one component, with diameters between 10 −7 and 10 −9 metres, suspended in a continuous phase of another component. The mixture has properties between those of a solution and a fine suspension
- colonial experiencer — affluent young Englishman who gained experience of farming, etc in colonial Australia
- colorado blue spruce — blue spruce.
- colorpoint shorthair — any of a breed of domestic cat, bred by crossing a Siamese and an American shorthair, with blue, almond-shaped eyes and a short, glossy, white coat shading to a darker color at the face, ears, feet, and tail
- colour look-up table — colour palette
- comparative judgment — any judgment about whether there is a difference between two or more stimuli
- comparative religion — a field of study seeking to derive general principles from a comparison and classification of the growth and influence of various religions.
- compare and contrast — note similarities, differences
- compartmentalisation — Alternative form of compartmentalization.
- compartmentalization — to divide into categories or compartments.
- compensating balance — Also, compensated balance, compensation balance. a balance wheel in a timepiece, designed to compensate for variations in tension in the hair spring caused by changes in temperature.
- 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
- compensation package — the sum of compensation awarded in a legal case
- compensatory damages — sum paid for a loss
- complaints procedure — a prescribed method of lodging a complaint to an institution
- complementary angles — either of two angles that added together produce an angle of 90°.
- complementary colors — any of two colors of the spectrum that, combined in the right intensities, produce white or nearly white light
- complementary colour — one of any pair of colours, such as yellow and blue, that give white or grey when mixed in the correct proportions
- complementary strand — either of the two chains that make up a double helix of DNA, with corresponding positions on the two chains being composed of a pair of complementary bases.
- complete unification — (programming) W.P. Weijland's name for unification without occur check.
- complex carbohydrate — a carbohydrate, as sucrose or starch, that consists of two or more monosaccharide units.
- composite photograph — a photograph formed by superimposing two or more separate photographs
- 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.
- computer programming — the activity or profession of writing computer programs
- computing dictionary — Free On-line Dictionary of Computing
- conformal projection — a map projection in which angles formed by lines are preserved: a map made using this projection preserves the shape of any small area.