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20-letter words containing s, e, r, p, n

  • compensatory damages — sum paid for a loss
  • complaints procedure — a prescribed method of lodging a complaint to an institution
  • complementary angles — either of two angles that added together produce an angle of 90°.
  • complementary colors — any of two colors of the spectrum that, combined in the right intensities, produce white or nearly white light
  • complementary strand — either of the two chains that make up a double helix of DNA, with corresponding positions on the two chains being composed of a pair of complementary bases.
  • comprehensive school — a secondary school for children of all abilities from the same district
  • compression ignition — ignition of engine fuel by the heat of air compressed in the cylinders into which the fuel is introduced.
  • computer typesetting — a system for the high-speed composition of type by a device driven by punched paper tape or magnetic tape that has been processed by a computer
  • conditioned response — a response that is transferred from the second to the first of a pair of stimuli. A well-known Pavlovian example is salivation by a dog when it hears a bell ring, because food has always been presented when the bell has been rung previously
  • connector conspiracy — (business, standard)   The tendency of manufacturers (or, by extension, other designers) to come up with products that don't fit with the old stuff, thereby making you buy either all new stuff or expensive interface devices. The term probably came into prominence with the appearance of the DEC KL-10, none of whose connectors matched anything else. The KL-10 Massbus connector was actually *patented* by DEC, who reputedly refused to licence the design, thus effectively locking out competition for the lucrative Massbus peripherals market. This policy was a source of frustration for the owners of dying, obsolescent disk and tape drives. A related phenomenon is the invention of new screw heads so that only Designated Persons, possessing the magic screwdrivers, can remove covers and make repairs or install options. Older Apple Macintoshes took this one step further, requiring not only a hex wrench but a specialised case-cracking tool to open the box. With the advent of more open-systems computing this term has fallen somewhat into disuse. Compare backward combatability.
  • conservative baptist — a member of a Protestant denomination (Conservative Baptist Association of America) organized in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, in 1948.
  • consumer price index — The consumer price index is an official measure of the rate of inflation within a country's economy. The abbreviation CPI is also used.
  • contact metamorphism — localized metamorphism resulting from the heat of an igneous intrusion.
  • contempt of congress — contempt of a U.S. Congressional body, as of an investigating committee, shown by a witness summoned or appearing before it.
  • controlled explosion — the deliberate detonation of an explosive device under strictly controlled circumstances
  • conversation stopper — a comment that is so shocking or boring that people stop talking
  • corresponding angles — a pair of nonadjacent angles, one interior and one exterior, on the same side of a transversal: these paired angles are equal if the lines cut by the transversal are parallel
  • craft apprenticeship — a period of training for a skilled trade in industry, such as for a plumber or electrician
  • craniosacral therapy — a form of therapy for various disorders in which the therapist manipulates the bones of the skull
  • crime and punishment — a novel (1866) by Feodor Dostoevsky.
  • criminal proceedings — action taken in a court to bring a criminal prosecution against someone
  • cross someone's palm — to give someone money
  • cross someone's path — to meet or thwart someone
  • decomposed petri net — (parallel)   (DPN) A Petri net that has been split into multiple, interconnected nets. This makes it easier to analyse or run the net. DPNs are the basis of concurrency in ConC.
  • deep vein thrombosis — Deep vein thrombosis is a serious medical condition caused by blood clots in the legs moving up to the lungs. The abbreviation DVT is also used.
  • deep-vein thrombosis — a condition in which a blood clot forms in a vein deep beneath the skin, typically in the leg or pelvic area: Immobility and lack of exercise are risk factors for deep-vein thrombosis.
  • definite description — a description that is modified by the definite article or a possessive, such as the woman in white or Rosemary's baby
  • depreciation expense — A depreciation expense is the amount deducted from gross profit to allow for a reduction in the value of something because of its age or how much it has been used.
  • descriptive notation — a method of denoting the squares on the chessboard in which each player names the files from the pieces that stand on them at the opening and numbers the ranks away from himself
  • desmopressin acetate — a vasopressin analogue, C 46 H 64 N 14 O 12 S 2 , used in the treatment of diabetes insipidus.
  • disciplinary hearing — a hearing at which the conduct of a member of an organization, profession etc is examined and a punishment may be handed down
  • dispersion hardening — the strengthening of an alloy as a result of the presence of fine particles in the lattice
  • displacement current — the rate of change, at any point in space, of electric displacement with time.
  • disproportionateness — The state or quality of being disproportionate or out of proportion.
  • drum and bugle corps — a marching band of drum players and buglers.
  • dun & bradstreet — an agency furnishing subscribers with information as to the financial standing and credit rating of businesses
  • eastern roman empire — the eastern of the two empires created by the division of the Roman Empire in 395 ad
  • eight queens problem — eight queens puzzle
  • enterprise javabeans — (specification, business, programming)   (EJB) A server-side component architecture for writing reusable business logic and portable enterprise applications. EJB is the basis of Sun's Java 2 Platform, Enterprise Edition (J2EE). Enterprise JavaBean components are written entirely in Java and run on any EJB compliant server. They are operating system, platform, and middleware independent, preventing vendor lock-in. EJB servers provide system-level services (the "plumbing") such as transactions, security, threading, and persistence. The EJB architecture is inherently transactional, distributed, multi-tier, scalable, secure, and wire protocol neutral - any protocol can be used: IIOP, JRMP, HTTP, DCOM etc. EJB 1.1 requires RMI for communication with components. EJB 2.0 is expected to require support for RMI/IIOP. EJB applications can serve assorted clients: browsers, Java, ActiveX, CORBA etc. EJB can be used to wrap legacy systems. EJB 1.1 was released in December 1999. EJB 2.0 is in development. Sun claims broad industry adoption. 30 vendors are shipping server products implementing EJB. Supporting vendors include IBM, Fujitsu, Sybase, Borland, Oracle, and Symantec. An alternative is Microsoft's MTS (Microsoft Transaction Server).
  • epidural anaesthesia — numbing injection in the spine
  • epitaxial transistor — a transistor made by depositing a thin pure layer of semiconductor material (epitaxial layer) onto a crystalline support by epitaxy. The layer acts as one of the electrode regions, usually the collector
  • equivalent air speed — the speed at sea level that would produce the same Pitot-static tube reading as that measured at altitude
  • european social fund — one of the four Structural Funds of the European Union which aims to support employment and the economic and social well-being of EU member countries
  • evening primrose oil — an oil, obtained from the seeds of the evening primrose, that is claimed to stimulate the production of prostaglandins
  • external respiration — exchange of oxygen and carbon dioxide across external or respiratory surfaces, as gills or lungs, in multicellular organisms
  • feather in one's cap — one of the horny structures forming the principal covering of birds, consisting typically of a hard, tubular portion attached to the body and tapering into a thinner, stemlike portion bearing a series of slender, barbed processes that interlock to form a flat structure on each side.
  • field ion microscope — a device in which the atomic structure of the surface of a conductor is made visible by introducing helium gas into the device and applying a high voltage to ionize and accelerate the gas toward a fluorescent screen.
  • field-ion microscope — a device in which the atomic structure of the surface of a conductor is made visible by introducing helium gas into the device and applying a high voltage to ionize and accelerate the gas toward a fluorescent screen.
  • first point of aries — the vernal equinox.
  • first-person shooter — a type of video game in which the player assumes the field of vision of the protagonist, so that the game camera includes the character's weapon, but the rest of the character model is not seen. Abbreviation: FPS.
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