18-letter words containing p, o, l, i, c, e
- self-contemplation — the act or process of thinking about oneself or one's values, beliefs, behavior, etc.
- self-preoccupation — the state of being preoccupied.
- sleeping policeman — a bump built across roads, esp in housing estates, to deter motorists from speeding
- sling psychrometer — a psychrometer so designed that the wet-bulb thermometer can be ventilated, to expedite evaporation, by whirling in the air.
- special collection — a collection of materials segregated from a general library collection according to form, subject, age, condition, rarity, source, or value.
- special prosecutor — (formerly) an independent counsel.
- spectrocolorimetry — the quantitative measure of colors by spectrophotometry.
- spectrofluorimeter — an instrument in which the spectrum of secondarily emitted fluorescent light is used to identify chemical compounds.
- spectroheliography — the process of obtaining an image of the sun in light of a particular wavelength, such as calcium or hydrogen, showing the distribution of the element over the surface and in the solar atmosphere, using a spectroheliograph
- spectropolarimeter — an instrument for determining the extent to which plane-polarized light of various wavelengths is rotated by certain solutions, consisting of a combination of a spectroscope and a polarimeter.
- spectropolariscope — an instrument combining the functions of a spectroscope with those of a polariscope.
- spherical geometry — the branch of geometry that deals with figures on spherical surfaces.
- split-level cooker — a cooker that is designed with a separate oven and hob so that they can be fitted wherever is most convenient in the kitchen
- stepping-off place — jumping-off place (def 2).
- subatomic particle — physics:
- talent competition — a contest in which people compete by showcasing their talents, for example in singing, dancing, acrobatics, etc
- telephone receiver — a device, as in a telephone, that converts changes in an electric current into sound.
- television company — a company that broadcasts programmes by television
- the encyclopedists — the writers of the French Encyclopedia (1751-72) edited by Diderot and d'Alembert, which contained the advanced ideas of the period
- the family compact — the ruling oligarchy in Upper Canada in the early 19th century
- the-cocktail-party — a play in verse (1950) by T. S. Eliot.
- to be tickled pink — If you are tickled pink, you are extremely pleased about something.
- to fall into place — If things fall into place, events happen naturally to produce a situation you want.
- to lick into shape — If you lick, knock, or whip someone or something into shape, you use whatever methods are necessary to change or improve them so that they are in the condition that you want them to be in.
- to scrape a living — If you say that someone scrapes a living or scratches a living, you mean that they manage to earn enough to live on, but it is very difficult. In American English, you say they scrape out a living or scratch out a living.
- unit magnetic pole — the unit of magnetic pole strength equal to the strength of a magnetic pole that repels a similar pole with a force of one dyne, the two poles being placed in a vacuum and separated by a distance of one centimeter.
- unit-linked policy — a life-assurance policy, the investment benefits of which are directly in proportion to the number of units in a unit trust purchased on the policyholder's behalf
- universal coupling — a coupling between rotating shafts set at an angle to one another, allowing for rotation in three planes.
- upper palaeolithic — the latest of the three periods of the Palaeolithic, beginning about 40 000 bc and ending, in Europe, about 12 000 bc: characterized by the emergence of modern man, Homo sapiens