17-letter words containing p, o, r, n, t
- the upper regions — the sky; heavens
- thermal expansion — expansion caused by heat
- thermal pollution — a rise in the temperature of rivers or lakes that is injurious to water-dwelling life and is caused by the disposal of heated industrial waste water or water from the cooling towers of nuclear power plants.
- thought-provoking — If something such as a book or a film is thought-provoking, it contains interesting ideas that make people think seriously.
- throat microphone — a microphone worn around the throat and actuated by vibrations of the larynx, used when background noise would obscure the sound of speech, as in an airplane cockpit.
- to know the ropes — If you know the ropes, you know how a particular job or task should be done.
- to open your eyes — If something opens your eyes, it makes you aware that something is different from the way that you thought it was.
- to open your mind — If something opens your mind to new ideas or experiences, it makes you more willing to accept them or try them.
- to slip your mind — If something slips your mind, you forget it.
- top-security wing — a wing of a prison, mental hospital, etc that has a very high level of precautions against escape
- traffic policeman — a policeman controlling traffic, esp while stationed at an intersection, or enforcing traffic regulations
- trapdoor function — a function defined from data by means of a mathematical procedure in such a way that it is easy to obtain the function when the data are known, but when the procedure and data are not known it becomes very difficult to determine the original data: used in cryptography, where the data are the characters of the plain text, or message, and the trapdoor function is the cryptogram.
- travelling people — Gypsies or other itinerant people: a term used esp by such people of themselves
- tropical medicine — the branch of medicine dealing with the study and treatment of diseases occurring in the tropics.
- unconformity trap — An unconformity trap is a hydrocarbon trap where the closure is made by an unconformity (= a formation of rock layers which represents a gap in the geological record).
- uncooperativeness — working or acting together willingly for a common purpose or benefit.
- undercompensation — to compensate or pay less than is fair, customary, or expected.
- unemployment rate — percentage of population without jobs
- unify corporation — (company) Developers of the Unify relational database. At one time, before Sybase, they were a competitor of Oracle, et al.
- unproportionately — proportioned; being in due proportion; proportional.
- urban development — the development or improvement of an urban area by building
- urban exploration — a recreational activity in which people explore derelict urban structures such as abandoned sewers or underground railways or attempt to access areas which are closed to the public such as the roofs of skyscrapers
- vacuum aspiration — menstrual extraction.
- war correspondent — a reporter or commentator assigned to send news or opinions directly from battle areas.
- weapons inspector — a person who inspects a country's weapons
- wedding reception — party after a marriage
- well-proportioned — adjusted to proper proportion or relation.
- weston-super-mare — a town and resort in SW England, in North Somerset unitary authority, Somerset, on the Bristol Channel. Pop: 78 044 (2001)
- winter heliotrope — a creeping perennial, Petasites fragrans, related to the butterbur, having lilac to heliotrope-coloured flowers smelling of vanilla: found chiefly on road verges
- worth every penny — If you say that something or someone is worth every penny, you mean that they are worth all the money that is spent on them.
- xerox corporation — (company) A US company, founded in 1906, specialising in document related technology and services including photocopiers, printers and office software. Xerox's acquisition of Affiliated Computer Services added business process and document management to their product range. In 2013 they have 140,000 employees. Their research centre, XEROX PARC, prototyped several revolutionary advances in computing, which the company failed to exploit, including the WIMP desktop metaphor and XEROX Network Services.
- youth programming — the creation and scheduling of television programmes specifically aimed at young people
- zero-point energy — energy in a substance at the temperature of absolute zero.