20-letter words containing p, r, o, u
- pull (one's) rank on — to take advantage of one's military rank in enforcing commands or one's high position or seniority in making demands on (a subordinate)
- put the hard word on — to ask or demand something from
- pyroligneous alcohol — methyl alcohol.
- quantum cryptography — a method of coding information based on quantum mechanics, which is said to be unbreakable
- queen of the prairie — a tall plant, Filipendula rubra, of the rose family, having branching clusters of pink flowers, growing in meadows and prairies.
- raynaud's phenomenon — a secondary circulatory disorder, often associated with a primary vascular disease, characterized by changes of blood flow resulting in white, bluish, or red hands and feet
- reciprocal insurance — insurance in which members of a reciprocal exchange, acting through an attorney-in-fact, insure themselves and each other.
- refuse disposal unit — a unit or part of a sink that disposes of waste food, etc, by grinding
- republic of maldives — a republic occupying an archipelago of 1087 coral islands in the Indian Ocean, southwest of Sri Lanka: came under British protection in 1887; became independent in 1965 and a republic in 1968; member of the Commonwealth (1982–2016). The economy and infrastructure were severely damaged in the Indian Ocean tsunami of December 2004. Official language: Divehi. Official religion: (Sunni) Muslim. Currency: rufiyaa. Capital: Malé. Pop: 393 988 (2013 est). Area: 298 sq km (115 sq miles)
- request for proposal — (programming) (RFP) The publication by a prospective software purchaser of details of the required system in order to attract offers by software developers to supply it. Software development under contract starts with the selection of the software developer by the customer. A request for proposal (also called in Britain an "invitation to tender") is the beginning of the selection process.
- réseaux ip européens — (RIPE) A collaboration between European networks which use the TCP/IP protocol suite to provide Internet services.
- respiratory quotient — the ratio of the amount of carbon dioxide released by the lungs to the amount of oxygen taken in during a given period.
- rocky mountain sheep — bighorn.
- rotations per minute — revolutions per minute
- rub up the wrong way — to arouse anger (in); annoy
- santa cruz operation — (SCO) A supplier of Unix systems for Intel microprocessors. They supply Xenix and Open Desktop. Founded in 1979, SCO became a public company in May, 1993 and trades on the Nasdaq National Market System under the symbol SCOC. SCO maintains its world headquarters in Santa Cruz, California, USA; a European headquarters in Watford, England; a Government Systems Group in Reston, Virginia; and offices in Asia, Australia, Canada, Latin America, and throughout Europe and the United States. In February 1993, SCO acquired IXI Limited of Cambridge, England, the leading supplier of Unix System windowing software.
- semiautobiographical — pertaining to or being a fictionalized account of an author's own life.
- sing for your supper — If someone has to sing for their supper, they have to do a job before they are allowed to do something they want to do.
- slip through the net — If criminals slip through the net, they avoid being caught by the system or trap that was meant to catch them.
- soke of peterborough — a former administrative unit of E central England, generally considered part of Northamptonshire or Huntingdonshire: absorbed into Cambridgeshire in 1974
- sound motion picture — a motion picture with a soundtrack.
- south american plate — a major tectonic division of the earth's crust, comprising the continent of South America and several ocean basins and bounded on the north by the Caribbean Plate, on the east by the Mid-Atlantic Ridge, on the west by a submarine trench that borders the western coast of the continent, and on the south by the Antarctic Plate.
- south temperate zone — the part of the earth's surface between the tropic of Capricorn and the Antarctic Circle.
- special patrol group — a former police unit tasked with counter terrorism in the Royal Ulster Constabulary
- spontaneous abortion — miscarriage (def 1).
- spontaneous recovery — the reappearance of a response after its extinction has been followed by a period of rest
- spontaneous-abortion — Also called voluntary abortion. the removal of an embryo or fetus from the uterus in order to end a pregnancy.
- square of opposition — a diagrammatic representation of the opposition of categorical propositions.
- subscription edition — an edition of one or more volumes for which a number of prospective purchasers place orders, usually in advance of publication.
- subscription library — a commercial lending library
- superior conjunction — the alignment of an inferior planet and the sun in which the planet is at the far side of the sun from the earth.
- supersonic transport — a commercial jet airplane that can fly faster than the speed of sound. Abbreviation: SST.
- telephone subscriber — a person who subscribes to a telephone service
- therapeutic abortion — abortion performed when a woman's pregnancy endangers her health.
- throw up one's hands — the terminal, prehensile part of the upper limb in humans and other primates, consisting of the wrist, metacarpal area, fingers, and thumb.
- to bring up the rear — If a person or vehicle is bringing up the rear, they are the last person or vehicle in a moving line of them.
- to clean up your act — If someone who has been behaving badly cleans up their act, they start to behave in a more acceptable or responsible way.
- to disturb the peace — If someone is accused of disturbing the peace, they are accused of behaving in a noisy and offensive way in public.
- to keep your balance — If you keep your balance, for example, when standing in a moving vehicle, you remain steady and do not fall over. If you lose your balance, you become unsteady and fall over.
- to keep your hand in — If you do something to keep your hand in, you practise a skill or hobby occasionally in order to remain fairly good at it.
- to line your pockets — If you say that someone is lining their own or someone else's pockets, you disapprove of them because they are making money dishonestly or unfairly.
- to make up your mind — If you make up your mind or make your mind up, you decide which of a number of possible things you will have or do.
- to pull your punches — If you say that someone does not pull their punches when they are criticizing a person or thing, you mean that they say exactly what they think, even though this might upset or offend people.
- to put sth to rights — to make something consistent with justice, correctness, or orderly arrangement
- to spread your wings — If you spread your wings, you do something new and rather difficult or move to a new place, because you feel more confident in your abilities than you used to and you want to gain wider experience.
- transposed conjugate — adjoint (def 2).
- triple witching hour — the last hour of trading on the New York Stock Exchange on the four Fridays each year when stock options, stock index futures, and options on such futures simultaneously expire: regarded as a time of extreme volatility in trading.
- tropical disturbance — a very weak, or incipient, tropical cyclone.
- trumpet call for sth — a signal for something
- turn an honest penny — to earn money fairly and honestly