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16-letter words containing t, a, p, l

  • photocoagulation — a surgical technique using an intense beam of light from a laser or a xenon-arc bulb to seal blood vessels or coagulate tissue, used primarily in ophthalmology to repair detached retinas or to treat certain kinds of retinopathy.
  • photograph album — bound book for photos
  • photolithography — the technique or art of making photolithographs.
  • photopolarimeter — a polarimeter that uses a photocell.
  • phylogenetically — the development or evolution of a particular group of organisms.
  • physical fitness — good physical condition
  • physical therapy — the treatment or management of physical disability, malfunction, or pain by exercise, massage, hydrotherapy, etc., without the use of medicines, surgery, or radiation.
  • physical-capital — tools, machinery, computers, and other equipment that are needed for the production of goods and services: money spent by business firms on physical capital.
  • pigs in blankets — small frankfurters wrapped in dough and baked, served as an appetizer
  • pineal apparatus — a median outgrowth of the roof of the diencephalon in vertebrates that in some develops into the pineal eye and in others into the pineal gland.
  • pitch-cone angle — (in a bevel gear) the apex angle of the truncated cone (pitch cone) which forms the reference surface on which the teeth of a bevel gear are cut
  • place in the sun — (often initial capital letter) the star that is the central body of the solar system, around which the planets revolve and from which they receive light and heat: its mean distance from the earth is about 93 million miles (150 million km), its diameter about 864,000 miles (1.4 million km), and its mass about 330,000 times that of the earth; its period of surface rotation is about 26 days at its equator but longer at higher latitudes.
  • placement office — an office in a university that offers students careers advice and help to find employment
  • plainclothes man — a detective or police officer who wears civilian clothes while on duty
  • planetary nebula — an expanding shell of thin ionized gas that is ejected from and surrounds a hot, dying star of about the same mass as the sun; the gas absorbs ultraviolet radiation from the central star and reemits it as visible light by the process of fluorescence.
  • plant bargaining — a form of bargaining within industry, involving either informal small groups of employees or collective agreements at plant level
  • plaster of paris — calcined gypsum in white, powdery form, used as a base for gypsum plasters, as an additive of lime plasters, and as a material for making fine and ornamental casts: characterized by its ability to set rapidly when mixed with water.
  • platform-balance — a scale with a platform for holding the items to be weighed.
  • platinum-iridium — (standard)   A standard, against which all others of the same category are measured. Usage: silly. The notion is that one of whatever it is has actually been cast in platinum-iridium alloy and placed in the vault beside the Standard Kilogram at the International Bureau of Weights and Measures near Paris, as the bar defining the standard metre once was. "This garbage collection algorithm has been tested against the platinum-iridium cons cell in Paris." Compare golden.
  • platoon sergeant — the senior noncommissioned officer in a platoon, equivalent to sergeant first class.
  • play off against — If you play people off against each other, you make them compete or argue, so that you gain some advantage.
  • play-action pass — a pass play designed to deceive the defense by appearing to be a running play, in which the quarterback fakes a hand-off to a back before throwing a forward pass.
  • player character — a character in a role-playing game or video game who is controlled by the person playing the game. Abbreviation: PC. Compare nonplayer character.
  • pleasure steamer — a boat powered by steam, used for recreational purposes
  • pledged delegate — (in the US) a delegate at a national party convention who is mandated to vote for a particular candidate
  • plutarch's lives — (Parallel Lives) a collection (a.d. 105–15) by Plutarch of short biographies of the leading political figures of ancient Greece and Rome.
  • plymouth company — a company, formed in England in 1606 to establish colonies in America and that founded a colony in Maine in 1607.
  • pocket billiards — pool2 (def 1).
  • point of sailing — the bearing of a sailing vessel, considered with relation to the direction of the wind.
  • polar coordinate — Usually, polar coordinates. one of two coordinates used to locate a point in a plane by the length of its radius vector and the angle this vector makes with the polar axis (polar angle)
  • polar opposition — the relation between a pair of antonyms that denote relatively higher and lower degrees of a quality with respect to an explicit or implicit norm rather than absolute values, as the relation between tall and short or light and dark, but not between true and false.
  • police constable — police officer
  • policy statement — a declaration of the plans and intentions of an organization or government
  • political asylum — asylum provided by one nation to refugees, especially political refugees, from another nation.
  • political system — a coordinated set of principles, laws, ideas, and procedures relating to a particular form of government, or the form of government itself: Democracy is a political system in which citizens govern themselves.
  • politicalization — to cause to be political; color with politics.
  • polycondensation — formation of a polymer by chemical condensation with the elimination of a small molecule, such as water.
  • polyvinyl acetal — any of the class of thermoplastic resins derived by the condensation of an aldehyde with polyvinyl alcohol.
  • port phillip bay — a bay in SE Australia: the harbor of Melbourne. 31 miles (50 km) long; 25 miles (40 km) wide.
  • portable airtime — (communications, wireless)   A wireless, digital communications system enabling user-to-user voice communication, "quicknotes", and alphanumeric messaging.
  • portal-to-portal — noting or pertaining to the time a worker spends from entering the workplace to stepping outside, especially in relation to pay.
  • portrait gallery — a gallery where pictures are displayed
  • post-apocalyptic — of or like an apocalypse; affording a revelation or prophecy.
  • post-elizabethan — of or relating to the reign of Elizabeth I, queen of England, or to her times: Elizabethan diplomacy; Elizabethan music.
  • postencephalitic — inflammation of the substance of the brain.
  • potemkin village — a pretentiously showy or imposing façade intended to mask or divert attention from an embarrassing or shabby fact or condition.
  • potential energy — the energy of a body or a system with respect to the position of the body or the arrangement of the particles of the system.
  • powerpc platform — (architecture, standard)   (PPCP, PReP - PowerPC Reference Platform, formerly CHRP - Common Hardware Reference Platform) An open system standard, designed by IBM, intended to ensure compatibility among PowerPC-based systems built by different companies. The PReP standard specifies the PCI bus, but will also support ISA, MicroChannel and PCMCIA. PReP-compliant systems will be able to run the Macintosh OS, OS/2, WorkplaceOS, AIX, Solaris, Taligent and Windows NT. IBM systems will (of course) be PReP-compliant. Apple's first PowerPC Macintoshes will not be compliant, but future ones may be.
  • practical effect — Usually, practical effects. a special effect that is created live on the set of a film, using real-world objects.
  • practical reason — (in Kantian ethics) reason applied to the problem of action and choice, especially in ethical matters.
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