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18-letter words containing s, b, l

  • bilateral symmetry — the property of an organism or part of an organism such that, if cut in only one plane, the two cut halves are mirror images of each other
  • bill of quantities — a document drawn up by a quantity surveyor providing details of the prices, dimensions, etc, of the materials required to build a large structure, such as a factory
  • biological parents — the biological mother and father of a child
  • bipolar transistor — (electronics)   A transistor made from a sandwich of n- and p-type semiconductor material: either npn or pnp. The middle section is known as the "base" and the other two as the "collector" and "emitter". When used as an amplifying element, the base to emitter junction is in a "forward-biased" (conducting) condition, and the base to collector junction is "reverse-biased" or non-conducting. Small changes in the base to emitter current (the input signal) cause either holes (for pnp devices) or free electrons (for npn) to enter the base from the emitter. The attracting voltage of the collector causes the majority of these charges to cross into and be collected by the collector, resulting in amplification. Contrast field effect transistor.
  • bird's-foot violet — a North American violet (Viola pedata) having divided leaves and large blue or purple flowers
  • bitwise complement — The bitwise complement of a bit field is a bit field of the same length but with each zero changed to a one and vice versa. This is the same as the ones complement of a binary integer.
  • biz-core stability — (security)   Internet security products which secure the business core.
  • black lives matter — a political and social movement originating among African Americans, emphasizing basic human rights and racial equality for black people and campaigning against various forms of racism. Abbreviations: BLM, B.L.M.
  • black-necked stork — a large Australian stork, Xenorhyncus asiaticus, having a white plumage, dark green back and tail, and red legs
  • blanche of castile — ?1188–1252, queen consort (1223–26) of Louis VIII of France, born in Spain. The mother of Louis IX, she acted as regent during his minority (1226–36) and his absence on a crusade (1248–52)
  • blissful ignorance — unawareness or inexperience of something unpleasant
  • bloggs family, the — An imaginary family consisting of Fred and Mary Bloggs and their children. Used as a standard example in knowledge representation to show the difference between extensional and intensional objects. For example, every occurrence of "Fred Bloggs" is the same unique person, whereas occurrences of "person" may refer to different people. Members of the Bloggs family have been known to pop up in bizarre places such as the DEC Telephone Directory. Compare Mbogo, Dr. Fred.
  • blot sb's copybook — If you blot your copybook, you spoil your good reputation by doing something wrong.
  • blue-plate special — an inexpensive restaurant meal served at a fixed price on a large plate, originally blue
  • board of elections — a bipartisan board appointed usually by local authorities and charged with control of elections and voting procedure.
  • boltzmann constant — the ratio of the gas constant to the Avogadro constant, equal to 1.380 650 × 10–23 joule per kelvin
  • bomb disposal unit — a unit of the police or armed services specializing in bomb disposal
  • boole's inequality — the theorem that the probability of several events occurring is less than or equal to the sum of the probabilities of each event occurring.
  • borosilicate glass — any of a range of heat- and chemical-resistant glasses, such as Pyrex, prepared by fusing together boron(III) oxide, silicon dioxide, and, usually, a metal oxide
  • bottle-nosed whale — any of various beaked whales of the family Hyperoodontidae, characterized by a bulbous forehead, especially Hyperoodon ampullatus of the North Atlantic.
  • bottlenose dolphin — any dolphin of the genus Tursiops, esp T. truncatus, some of which have been kept in captivity and trained to perform tricks
  • boulogne-sur-seine — an industrial suburb of SW Paris. Pop: 106 367 (1999)
  • branch to fishkill — (IBM: from the location of one of the corporation's facilities) Any unexpected jump in a program that produces catastrophic or just plain weird results. See jump off into never-never land, hyperspace.
  • brazilian rosewood — a Brazilian tree, Dalbergia nigra, of the legume family.
  • brazilian sapphire — a blue variety of tourmaline used as a gem: not a true sapphire.
  • break your silence — If someone breaks their silence about something, they talk about something that they have not talked about before or for a long time.
  • breast enlargement — a surgical procedure to increase the size of a woman's breasts
  • breathe one's last — When someone breathes their last, they die.
  • brewer's blackbird — a blackbird, Euphagus cyanocephalus, of the U.S., the male of which has greenish-black plumage with a purplish-black head.
  • brightness control — a control that enables the brightness of the image on a television screen, computer monitor, etc to be adjusted
  • bring someone luck — If you say that something brings bad luck or brings someone good luck, you believe that it has an influence on whether good or bad things happen to them.
  • bring-and-buy sale — A bring-and-buy sale is an informal sale to raise money for a charity or other organization. People who come to the sale bring things to be sold and buy things that other people have brought.
  • british somaliland — a former British protectorate (1884–1960) in E Africa, on the Gulf of Aden: united with Italian Somaliland in 1960 to form Somalia (or the Somali Republic); in 1991 the self-styled republic of Somaliland, covering the same area as the former British Somaliland, declared itself independent and continues to function largely as a separate entity, though without international recognition
  • building materials — materials such as bricks, cement, timber, etc
  • built-in self test — (BIST) The technique of designing circuits with additional logic which can be used to test proper operation of the primary (functional) logic.
  • bullnose stretcher — bull stretcher (def 1).
  • bullnose-stretcher — Also called bullnose stretcher. a brick having one of the edges along its length rounded for laying as a stretcher in a sill or the like.
  • burkitt's lymphoma — a cancer characterized by tumors containing lymphoid cells, occurring esp. in children, in the jaw, eyes, and internal organs: it is associated with the Epstein-Barr virus
  • butler's sideboard — a sideboard, often with a fall front, having on its top a china cabinet with glazed doors.
  • california rosebay — a Pacific coast shrub or tree (Rhododendron californicum) of the heath family, with rosy or purplish flowers
  • camel's-hair brush — an artist's small brush, made of hair from a squirrel's tail
  • cape breton island — an island off SE Canada, in NE Nova Scotia, separated from the mainland by the Strait of Canso: its easternmost point is Cape Breton. Pop: 132 298 (2006). Area: 10 280 sq km (3970 sq miles)
  • carisbrooke castle — a castle near Newport on the Isle of Wight: Charles I was held prisoner here from 1647 until his execution in 1649
  • cas 8051 assembler — An experimental one-pass assembler for the 8051 with C-like syntax by Mark Hopkins. Most features of a modern assembler included except macros (soon to be added). Requires an ANSI-C compiler. Ported to MS-DOS, Ultrix, Sun-4. (July 1993). Version 1.2. Assembler/linker, disassembler, documentation, examples.
  • chambered nautilus — nautilus (def 1).
  • civil disobedience — Civil disobedience is the refusal by ordinary people in a country to obey laws or pay taxes, usually as a protest.
  • claustrophobically — In a claustrophobic way.
  • closed-box testing — functional testing
  • coffee-table music — unadventurous music
  • common-law husband — a man considered to be a woman's husband after the couple have cohabited for several years
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