15-letter words containing r, a, b, i, n, o
- bioastronautics — the study of the effects of space flight on living organisms
- black operation — a covert and undocumented military operation
- bladder campion — a European caryophyllaceous plant, Silene vulgaris, having white flowers with an inflated calyx
- blasting powder — a form of gunpowder made with sodium nitrate instead of saltpeter, used chiefly for blasting rock, ore, etc.
- blenheim orange — a type of apple tree bearing gold-coloured apples
- boa constrictor — A boa constrictor is a large snake that kills animals by wrapping itself round their bodies and squeezing them to death. Boa constrictors are found mainly in South and Central America and the West Indies.
- boarding school — A boarding school is a school which some or all of the pupils live in during the school term. Compare day school.
- body toning bar — a weighted exercise bar made of steel encased in a layer of foam, used for toning and strength training.
- bohemian forest — a mountain range between the SW Czech Republic and SE Germany. Highest peak: Arber, 1457 m (4780 ft)
- bookmaking firm — an organization that accepts bets from gamblers and pays out winnings
- borderline case — a person or thing that is not clearly classifiable as something
- boston marriage — (especially in 19th-century New England) an intimate friendship between two women often maintaining a household together.
- brachistochrone — the curve between two points through which a body moves under the force of gravity in a shorter time than for any other curve; the path of quickest descent
- branchial pouch — one of a series of rudimentary outcroppings of the inner pharyngeal wall, corresponding to the branchial grooves on the surface.
- branchiostegous — branchiostegal.
- brand extension — the practice of using a well-known brand name to promote new products or services in unrelated fields
- break-in period — a period during which certain restrictions or moderation in operating should be followed, as the avoidance of high speed, rapid acceleration, or severe braking for a new automobile.
- breakeven point — a point at which the total revenue and total cost are equal
- breaking plough — a plough with a long shallow mouldboard for turning virgin land or sod land
- breeding season — the time of year during which animals breed
- bring to a head — to bring or be brought to a crisis
- bristol channel — an inlet of the Atlantic, between S Wales and SW England, merging into the Severn estuary. Length: about 137 km (85 miles)
- bristol fashion — clean and neat, with newly painted and scrubbed surfaces, brass polished, etc
- britneyfication — the effect on clothes and fashions of following the revealing styles favoured by the US pop singer Britney Spears (born 1981)
- brompheniramine — a substance, C 16 H 19 BrN 2 , used as an antihistamine in the management of various allergies, as hay fever.
- bronchial tubes — the bronchi or their smaller divisions
- bronze diabetes — hemochromatosis.
- brother-in-arms — a fellow soldier or comrade in a shared struggle
- brown-tail moth — a white moth, Nygmia phaerrhoea, having a brown tuft at the end of the abdomen, the larvae of which feed on the foliage of various shade and fruit trees.
- brownian motion — the irregular motion of small particles suspended in a liquid or a gas, caused by the bombardment of the particles by molecules of the medium: first observed by Robert Brown in 1827.
- bulimia nervosa — a disorder characterized by compulsive overeating followed by vomiting: sometimes associated with anxiety about gaining weight
- bureau of mines — a division of the Department of the Interior, created in 1910, that studies the nation's mineral resources and inspects mines.
- calydonian boar — a savage boar sent by Artemis to destroy Calydon, a city in Aetolia, because its king had neglected to sacrifice to her. It was killed by Meleager, the king's son
- campaign ribbon — a distinctively colored ribbon, either on a small, narrow bar or in the form of a strip, representing a military campaign participated in by the wearer.
- carbon fixation — the process by which plants assimilate carbon from carbon dioxide in the atmosphere to form metabolically active compounds
- carbon monoxide — Carbon monoxide is a poisonous gas that is produced especially by the engines of vehicles.
- cartesian doubt — willful suspension of all interpretations of experience that are not absolutely certain: used as a method of deriving, by elimination of such uncertainties, axioms upon which to base theories.
- cartier-bresson — Henri (ɑ̃ri). 1908–2004, French photographer
- centrifugal box — a revolving chamber, used in the spinning of manufactured filaments, in which the plastic fibers, subjected to centrifugal force, are slightly twisted and emerge in the form of yarn wound into the shape of a hollow cylinder.
- cinderella book — (publication) "Introduction to Automata Theory, Languages, and Computation", by John Hopcroft and Jeffrey Ullman, (Addison-Wesley, 1979). So called because the cover depicts a girl (putatively Cinderella) sitting in front of a Rube Goldberg device and holding a rope coming out of it. On the back cover, the device is in shambles after she has (inevitably) pulled on the rope. See also book titles.
- climb indicator — an instrument that shows the rate of ascent or descent of an aircraft, operating on a differential pressure principle.
- combat neurosis — battle fatigue.
- combinatorially — in a combinatorial manner
- commercial bank — a bank primarily concerned with accepting demand deposits, used as checking accounts
- configurability — The property of being configurable.
- contract bridge — the most common variety of bridge, in which the declarer receives points counting towards game and rubber only for tricks he bids as well as makes, any overtricks receiving bonus points
- contractability — (of a body or substance) the ability to become smaller, narrower, shorter, etc
- contractibility — contractability
- controllability — to exercise restraint or direction over; dominate; command: The car is difficult to control at high speeds. That zone is controlled by enemy troops.
- controller bias — In a control loop, the controller bias is a constant amount added to or subtracted from the action that a controller would normally take with a particular gain.