19-letter words containing r, i, p, o, s, t
- parasympathomimetic — having an effect similar to that produced when the parasympathetic nervous system is stimulated
- participatory sport — a sport in which people take part, (as opposed to a spectator sport)
- particle dispersoid — A particle dispersoid is a suspension of solid particles in a gas.
- particle separation — a rule that moves the particle of a phrasal verb, thus deriving a sentence like He looked the answer up from a structure that also underlies He looked up the answer
- particular solution — a solution of a differential equation containing no arbitrary constants.
- parting of the ways — When there is a parting of the ways, two or more people or groups of people stop working together or travelling together.
- pastoral counseling — the use of psychotherapeutic techniques by trained members of the clergy to assist parishioners who seek help for personal or emotional problems.
- pedestrian crossing — place to cross road
- perfect progressive — a verb form including the auxiliary have followed by been and a present participle, noting the continuation of an activity or event, its incompleteness or interruption, and its connection to the temporal point of reference, as in I've been waiting for over an hour, They had been talking about her before she came into the room, or In July, he will have been living here for two years.
- periodontal disease — any of various mixed bacterial infections that affect the soft tissues and bones supporting the teeth.
- peritoneal dialysis — a form of dialysis in which the peritoneum is used as an autogenous semipermeable membrane
- persecution complex — an acute irrational fear that other people are plotting one's downfall and that they are responsible for one's failures
- persistent offender — a person who repeatedly breaks the law
- personal stationery — headed notepaper
- philosopher's stone — a substance sought by alchemists that would be capable of transmuting baser metals into gold or silver and of prolonging life.
- philosophers' stone — a substance sought by alchemists that would be capable of transmuting baser metals into gold or silver and of prolonging life.
- photodisintegration — the disintegration of a nucleus, induced by its absorption of a photon.
- photoreconnaissance — reconnaissance using aerial photography.
- pirates of penzance — an operetta (1879) by Sir William S. Gilbert and Sir Arthur Sullivan.
- pistachio ice cream — ice cream flavoured with pistachios
- plastic deformation — In plastic deformation a material changes shape when a stress is applied to it and does not go back to its original state when the stress is removed.
- pneumogastric nerve — the vagus nerve.
- pointe-aux-trembles — a city in S Quebec, in E Canada, N of Montreal, on the St. Lawrence.
- police headquarters — building where police are stationed
- popular sovereignty — the doctrine that sovereign power is vested in the people and that those chosen to govern, as trustees of such power, must exercise it in conformity with the general will.
- population pressure — the force exerted by a growing population upon its environment, resulting in dispersal or reduction of the population.
- port jackson willow — an Australian acacia tree, Acacia cyanophylla, introduced in the 19th century into South Africa, where it is now regarded as a pest
- portuguese-speaking — being a speaker of Portuguese; having Portuguese as the national language
- post office problem — (algorithm) Given a set of points (in N dimensions), find another point which minimises the sum of the distances from that point to each of the others.
- post-and-rail fence — a fence constructed of upright wooden posts with horizontal timber slotted through it
- post-polio syndrome — Pathology. muscle weakness occurring several decades after recovery from a polio infection, caused by fatiguing of collateral nerve axons developed during physical rehabilitation.
- posterior pituitary — a small, somewhat cherry-shaped double structure attached by a stalk to the base of the brain and constituting the master endocrine gland affecting all hormonal functions in the body, consisting of an anterior region ((anterior pituitary) or (adenohypophysis)) that develops embryonically from the roof of the mouth and that secretes growth hormone, LH, FSH, ACTH, TSH, and MSH, a posterior region ((posterior pituitary) or (neurohypophysis)) that develops from the back of the forebrain and that secretes the hormones vasopressin and oxytocin, and an intermediate part (pars intermedia) derived from the anterior region but joined to the posterior region, that secretes the hormone MSH in lower vertebrates.
- postsynchronization — the process of adding sound, such as dubbing, to a film or video after shooting or videotaping is completed
- posttranscriptional — Genetics, Biochemistry. occurring after the formation of RNA from DNA but before the RNA strand leaves the nucleus.
- potassium carbonate — a white, granular, water-soluble powder, K 2 CO 3 , used chiefly in the manufacture of soap, glass, and potassium salts.
- potassium hydroxide — a white, deliquescent, water-soluble solid, KOH, usually in the form of lumps, sticks, or pellets, that upon solution in water generates heat: used chiefly in the manufacture of soap, as a laboratory reagent, and as a caustic.
- prescription charge — a charge, set by the government, to be paid by a patient for medicines
- presentation skills — the set of techniques and skills required successfully to present oral information to others
- presumption of fact — a presumption based on experience or knowledge of the relationship between a known fact and a fact inferred from it.
- primitive methodist — a member of a Protestant denomination (Primitive Methodist Church) founded in England in 1812 and later established in the U.S., characterized by its adherence to the basic doctrines, principles, and practices taught by John Wesley.
- printing discussion — [XEROX PARC] A protracted, low-level, time-consuming, generally pointless discussion of something only peripherally interesting to all.
- priority scheduling — (operating system) Processes scheduling in which the scheduler selects tasks to run based on their priority as opposed to, say, a simple round-robin. Priorities may be static or dynamic. Static priorities are assigned at the time of creation, while dynamic priorities are based on the processes' behaviour while in the system. For example, the scheduler may favour I/O-intensive tasks so that expensive requests can be issued as early as possible. A danger of priority scheduling is starvation, in which processes with lower priorities are not given the opportunity to run. In order to avoid starvation, in preemptive scheduling, the priority of a process is gradually reduced while it is running. Eventually, the priority of the running process will no longer be the highest, and the next process will start running. This method is called aging.
- prismatic telescope — a telescope having an eyepiece at the side or top equipped with a reflecting prism, used for taking sights at steep angles.
- private prosecution — a prosecution started by a private individual rather than by the police
- privatization issue — an issue of shares available for purchase by members of the public when a publicly owned organization is transferred to the private sector
- proctosigmoidoscope — sigmoidoscope.
- proctosigmoidoscopy — sigmoidoscopy.
- professionalization — to give a professional character or status to; make into or establish as a profession.
- profitability study — a study of how much profit a company, organization, etc, makes or how profitable it is
- programmer's switch — (hardware) A button on the front of some Apple Macintosh computers which, when pressed, causes a command line prompt to appear. This gives access to the built-in mini-debugger, which has commands to dump memory, return to the application that was broken out, and others. A more sophisticated debugger must be installed in order to inspect breakpoints, etc.