16-letter words containing t, e, s, c
- outside director — a director of a company who is not employed by that company but is often employed by a holding or associated company
- over-consumption — the act of consuming, as by use, decay, or destruction.
- over-descriptive — having the quality of describing; characterized by description: a descriptive passage in an essay.
- over-speculation — the contemplation or consideration of some subject: to engage in speculation on humanity's ultimate destiny.
- overcautiousness — the quality or state of being too cautious, wary, or careful
- overcompensating — Present participle of overcompensate.
- overcompensation — a pronounced striving to neutralize and conceal a strong but unacceptable character trait by substituting for it an opposite trait.
- overcompensatory — a pronounced striving to neutralize and conceal a strong but unacceptable character trait by substituting for it an opposite trait.
- overenthusiastic — full of or characterized by enthusiasm; ardent: He seems very enthusiastic about his role in the play.
- oversubscription — to subscribe for more of than is available, expected, or required: The charity drive was oversubscribed by several thousand dollars.
- ovshinsky effect — an effect that turns special types of glassy, thin films into semiconductors upon application of low voltage.
- pacific sturgeon — a dark gray sturgeon, Acipenser transmontanus, inhabiting marine and fresh waters along the northwestern coast of North America, valued as a food and sport fish.
- packet switching — a method of efficient data transmission whereby the initial message is broken into relatively small units, or packets, that are routed independently and subsequently reassembled.
- packet-switching — a method of efficient data transmission whereby the initial message is broken into relatively small units, or packets, that are routed independently and subsequently reassembled.
- paediatric nurse — a nurse who specializes in the care of children
- paratuberculosis — Johne's disease.
- particle physics — the branch of physics that deals with the properties and behavior of elementary particles.
- pascal's theorem — the theorem that the lines joining adjacent vertices of a hexagon intersect the same straight line if alternate vertices lie on two intersecting straight lines.
- paterson's curse — a purple-flowered noxious plant, Echium plantagineum, a close relative of viper's bugloss, naturalized in Australia and NZ where its harmfulness to livestock has prompted attempts to limit its spread
- pectoralis major — the larger of the two large chest muscles that assist in movements of the shoulder and upper arm
- pectoralis minor — the smaller of the two large chest muscles that assist in movements of the shoulder and upper arm
- pentatonic scale — a scale having five tones to an octave, as one having intervals that correspond to the five black keys of a piano octave.
- people's charter — the principles or movement of a party of political reformers, chiefly workingmen, in England from 1838 to 1848: so called from the document (People's Charter or National Charter) that contained a statement of their principles and demands.
- perfecting press — a rotary press for printing both sides of a sheet or web in one operation.
- performance test — a test requiring little or no use of language, the test materials being designed to elicit manual or behavioral responses rather than verbal ones.
- permaculturalist — a system of cultivation intended to maintain permanent agriculture or horticulture by relying on renewable resources and a self-sustaining ecosystem.
- personal effects — belongings
- personality cult — deliberately cultivated adulation of a person, esp a political leader
- pharmacogenetics — the branch of pharmacology that examines the relation of genetic factors to variations in response to drugs.
- pharmacokinetics — the branch of pharmacology that studies the fate of pharmacological substances in the body, as their absorption, distribution, metabolism, and elimination.
- photoluminescent — luminescence induced by the absorption of infrared radiation, visible light, or ultraviolet radiation.
- phrase structure — the hierarchical arrangement of the constituent words and phrases of a sentence.
- 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.
- pick up stompies — to come late to a conversation and so misunderstand what is being discussed
- pico de sao tome — an island in the Gulf of Guinea, off the W coast of Gabon, just N of the equator: the larger component of the Democratic Republic of São Tomé and Príncipe. 318 sq. mi. (824 sq. km).
- picture postcard — postcard (def 1).
- pincers movement — a military maneuver in which both flanks of an enemy force are attacked with the aim of attaining complete encirclement.
- pitch inspection — in inclement weather, a pre-match inspection of the playing surface in order to determine whether it is in good enough condition for the match to go ahead
- pitching pennies — a gambling game in which pennies are tossed to a mark or against a wall, the winner being the person whose penny lands closest to the mark or wall.
- 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.
- plainclothes man — a detective or police officer who wears civilian clothes while on duty
- 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.
- pocket billiards — pool2 (def 1).
- pocket secretary — a long, narrow walletlike case, usually of leather and containing pockets for credit and business cards, paper money, etc., and sometimes a notepad and pencil.
- poitou-charentes — a region of W central France, on the Bay of Biscay: mainly low-lying
- police constable — police officer
- police inspector — rank of police officer in the UK
- policy statement — a declaration of the plans and intentions of an organization or government
- 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.