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21-letter words containing s, u, n, d

  • lost in the underflow — (jargon)   Too small to be worth considering; more specifically, small beyond the limits of accuracy or measurement. This is a reference to "floating point underflow". The Hacker's Jargon File claimed that it is also a pun on "undertow" (a kind of fast, cold current that sometimes runs just offshore and can be dangerous to swimmers). "Well, sure, photon pressure from the stadium lights alters the path of a thrown baseball, but that effect gets lost in the underflow". Compare epsilon, epsilon squared; see also overflow bit.
  • lost-and-found column — a column in a newspaper that carries advertisements from people who have lost or found things
  • luck was on sb's side — If you say that luck was on someone's side, you mean that they succeeded in something by chance as well as by their own efforts or ability.
  • luminous flux density — luminous flux per unit of cross-sectional area.
  • madagascar aquamarine — a form of blue beryl from Madagascar, used as a gemstone
  • made of sterner stuff — If you say that someone is made of sterner stuff, you mean that they have a strong personality and are capable of overcoming difficulties and problems.
  • magnetic flux density — Also called magnetic flux density. a vector quantity used as a measure of a magnetic field. Symbol: B.
  • magnetofluid dynamics — magnetohydrodynamics.
  • marine superintendent — a person who is responsible for the maintenance of the vessels of a shipping line, for their docking and the handling of cargo, and for the hiring of personnel for deck departments.
  • mean square deviation — variance (def 3).
  • medical jurisprudence — forensic medicine.
  • medium access control — Media Access Control
  • motor neurone disease — Motor neurone disease is a disease which destroys the part of a person's nervous system that controls movement.
  • munchausen's syndrome — a mental disorder in which a patient feigns illness to obtain hospital treatment
  • muon-catalysed fusion — an experimental form of nuclear fusion in which hydrogen and deuterium muonic atoms are formed. Because the mass of the muon is much larger than that of the electron, the atoms are smaller, and the nuclei are close enough for fusion to occur
  • needs no introduction — If you say that someone or something needs no introduction, you mean that they are so well known that everyone knows who or what they are.
  • nitrosylsulfuric acid — a clear, straw-colored, oily, corrosive liquid, HNO 5 S, used chiefly in the manufacture of dyes.
  • noncustodial sentence — a punishment given by a court of law that does not involve a prison term, such as a fine or a restriction order
  • northumberland strait — the part of the Gulf of St. Lawrence that separates Prince Edward Island from New Brunswick and Nova Scotia, in SE Canada. About 200 miles (320 km) long; 9–30 miles (15–48 km) wide.
  • notre-dame-des-vertus — an industrial suburb of Paris, on the Seine. Pop: 63 136 (1999)
  • packed encoding rules — (protocol, standard)   (PER) ASN.1 encoding rules for producing a compact transfer syntax for data structures described in ASN.1, defined in 1994. PER provides a much more compact encoding then BER. It tries to represents the data units using the minimum number of bits. The compactness requires that the decoder knows the complete abstract syntax of the data structure to be decoded, however. Documents: ITU-T X.691, ISO 8825-2.
  • pass the hat (around) — In British English, if you pass the hat around, you collect money from a group of people, for example in order to give someone a present. In American English, you just say pass the hat.
  • pathfinder prospectus — a prospectus regarding the flotation of a new company that contains only sufficient details to test the market reaction
  • pdp assembly language — (language)   (PAL) The assembly language for the PDP-8 and PDP-11.
  • pincushion distortion — a distortion produced by a lens in which the magnification increases toward the edge of the field.
  • pipelined burst cache — Pipeline Burst Cache
  • ploughman's spikenard — a European plant, Inula conyza, with tubular yellowish flower heads surrounded by purple bracts: family Asteraceae (composites)
  • pomp and circumstance — ceremony
  • postpartum depression — Postpartum depression is a mental state involving feelings of anxiety and sudden mood swings which some women experience after they have given birth.
  • premenstrual syndrome — a complex of physical and emotional changes, including depression, irritability, appetite changes, bloating and water retention, breast soreness, and changes in muscular coordination, one or more of which may be experienced in the several days before the onset of menstrual flow. Abbreviation: PMS.
  • premium savings bonds — (in Britain) bonds issued by the Treasury since 1956 for purchase by the public. No interest is paid but there is a monthly draw for cash prizes of various sums
  • pro-industrialization — the large-scale introduction of manufacturing, advanced technical enterprises, and other productive economic activity into an area, society, country, etc.
  • progressive education — any of various reformist educational philosophies and methodologies since the late 1800s, applied especially to elementary schools, that reject the rote recitation and strict discipline of traditional, single-classroom teaching, favoring instead more stimulation of the individual pupil as well as group discussion, more informality in the classroom, a broader curriculum, and use of laboratories, gymnasiums, kitchens, etc., in the school.
  • prone pressure method — a method of artificial respiration in which the patient is placed face downward, pressure then being rhythmically applied with the hands to the lower part of the thorax.
  • pseudo-cleft sentence — cleft sentence (def 2).
  • public administration — the implementation of public policy, largely by the executive branch.
  • pulse code modulation — a form of modulation that transforms a wave-form, as an audio signal, into a binary signal in which information is conveyed by a coded order of pulses for transmission, storage on a disk, or processing by a computer. Abbreviation: PCM.
  • pulse-code modulation — a form of modulation that transforms a wave-form, as an audio signal, into a binary signal in which information is conveyed by a coded order of pulses for transmission, storage on a disk, or processing by a computer. Abbreviation: PCM.
  • pulse-time modulation — radio transmission in which the carrier is modulated to produce a series of pulses timed to transmit the amplitude and pitch of a signal. Abbr.: PTM.
  • purchasing department — the group of staff within an organization that is responsible for buying goods or products
  • purple-fringed orchis — either of two North American orchids (Habenaria psycodes and H. fimbriata) with purple-fringed flowers
  • put in the hard yards — to make a great effort to achieve an end
  • radius of convergence — a positive number so related to a given power series that the power series converges for every number whose absolute value is less than this particular number.
  • rayleigh distribution — (mathematics)   A curve that yields a good approximation to the actual labour curves on software projects.
  • reduced circumstances — If you say that someone is living in reduced circumstances, you mean that they do not have as much money as they used to have.
  • registration document — a document giving identification details of a motor vehicle, including its manufacturer, date of registration, engine and chassis numbers, and owner's name
  • residual unemployment — the unemployment that remains in periods of full employment, as a result of those mentally, physically, or emotionally unfit to work
  • ring-around-the-rosey — a children's game in which the players sing while going around in a circle and squat when the lyrics “all fall down” are sung.
  • rutherford scattering — the scattering of an alpha particle through a large angle with respect to the original direction of motion of the particle, caused by an atom (Rutherford atom) with most of the mass and all of the positive electric charge concentrated at a center or nucleus.
  • s-k reduction machine — An abstract machine defined by Professor David Turner to evaluate combinator expressions represented as binary graphs. Named after the two basic combinators, S and K.
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