17-letter words containing v, i, a, o
- photoreactivation — a process that repairs DNA damaged by ultraviolet light using an enzyme that requires visible light.
- photovoltaic cell — a photocell in which an electromotive force is generated by a photovoltaic effect.
- plastic explosive — a puttylike substance that contains an explosive charge, and is detonated by fuse or by remote control: used especially by terrorists and in guerrilla warfare.
- polyvinyl acetate — a colorless, odorless, nontoxic, transparent, thermoplastic, water-insoluble resin used as an adhesive in certain paints and as an intermediate in the synthesis of polyvinyl acetal and polyvinyl alcohol.
- polyvinyl alcohol — a colorless, water-soluble, thermoplastic resin, derived by the hydrolysis of polyvinyl acetate: used chiefly as an adhesive and as a sizing agent in the manufacture of textiles, paper, and plastics.
- polyvinyl butyral — a white, water-insoluble, polyvinyl acetal made with butyraldehyde, used chiefly as an interlayer in the manufacture of safety glass.
- positive feedback — Electronics. the process of returning part of the output of a circuit, system, or device to the input, either to oppose the input (negative feedback) or to aid the input (positive feedback) acoustic feedback.
- positive polarity — the grammatical characteristic of a word or phrase, such as delicious or rather, that may normally only be used in a semantically or syntactically positive or affirmative context
- potential divider — a resistor or series of resistors connected to a voltage source and used to provide voltages that are fractions of that of the source.
- prairie provinces — the Canadian provinces of Manitoba, Saskatchewan, and Alberta, which lie in the N Great Plains region of North America: the chief wheat and petroleum producing area of Canada
- pre-investigation — the act or process of investigating or the condition of being investigated.
- pre-revolutionary — of, pertaining to, characterized by, or of the nature of a revolution, or a sudden, complete, or marked change: a revolutionary junta.
- prerogative court — a former ecclesiastical court in England and Ireland for the trial of certain testamentary cases.
- private education — education provided by a private individual or organization, rather than by the state or a public body
- private ownership — the fact of being owned by a private individual or organization, rather than by the state or a public body
- pro forma invoice — an invoice issued before an order is placed or before the goods are delivered giving all the details and the cost of the goods
- pro-environmental — the aggregate of surrounding things, conditions, or influences; surroundings; milieu.
- probability curve — a curve that describes the distribution of probability over the values of a random variable.
- production values — the quality of a media production (such as a film) in regards to elements such as colours, quality, style, etc
- progressive party — a political party formed in 1912 under the leadership of Theodore Roosevelt, advocating popular control of government, direct primaries, the initiative, the referendum, woman suffrage, etc.
- promotional event — occasion organized to market or advertise sth
- protective tariff — a tariff levied on imports to protect the domestic economy rather than to raise revenue
- provincial police — (in Canada) the police force of a province, esp Ontario or Quebec
- provincialization — to make provincial in character.
- pseudo-aggressive — characterized by or tending toward unprovoked offensives, attacks, invasions, or the like; militantly forward or menacing: aggressive acts against a neighboring country.
- punitive taxation — a form of taxation that is very severe and that people find very difficult to pay
- quantity surveyor — A quantity surveyor is a person who calculates the cost and amount of materials and workers needed for a job such as building a house or a road.
- quasi-competitive — of, pertaining to, involving, or decided by competition: competitive sports; a competitive examination.
- radioactive decay — decay (def 8).
- radioactive waste — the radioactive by-products from the operation of a nuclear reactor or from the reprocessing of depleted nuclear fuel.
- recursive acronym — (convention) A hackish (and especially MIT) tradition is to choose acronyms and abbreviations that refer humorously to themselves or to other acronyms or abbreviations. The classic examples were two MIT editors called EINE ("EINE Is Not Emacs") and ZWEI ("ZWEI Was EINE Initially"). More recently, there is a Scheme compiler called LIAR (Liar Imitates Apply Recursively), and GNU stands for "GNU's Not Unix!" - and a company with the name CYGNUS, which expands to "Cygnus, Your GNU Support". See also mung.
- relative majority — the excess of votes or seats won by the winner of an election over the runner-up when no candidate or party has more than 50 per cent
- revascularization — the restoration of the blood circulation of an organ or area, achieved by unblocking obstructed or disrupted blood vessels or by surgically implanting replacements.
- revealed religion — religion based chiefly on the revelations of God to humans, especially as described in Scripture.
- revolutionary war — American Revolution.
- romantic movement — the late 18th- and early 19th-century movement in France, Germany, England, and America to establish Romanticism in art and literature.
- rotary cultivator — a machine for breaking up and tilling soil, consisting of a series of blades mounted on a revolving power-driven shaft
- saint bonaventure — Saint ("the Seraphic Doctor") 1221–74, Italian scholastic theologian.
- saint croix river — Also called Santa Cruz. a U.S. island in the N Lesser Antilles: the largest of the Virgin Islands. 82 sq. mi. (212 sq. km).
- saturation diving — a method of prolonged diving, using an underwater habitat to allow divers to remain in the high-pressure environment of the ocean depths long enough for their body tissues to become saturated with the inert components of the pressurized gas mixture that they breathe: when this condition is reached, the amount of time required for decompression remains the same, whether the dive lasts a day, a week, or a month.
- second derivative — the derivative of the derivative of a function: Acceleration is the second derivative of distance with respect to time.
- self-conservation — the act of conserving; prevention of injury, decay, waste, or loss; preservation: conservation of wildlife; conservation of human rights.
- self-preservation — preservation of oneself from harm or destruction.
- sinus of valsalva — any of the pouches of the aorta and the pulmonary artery opposite the flaps of the semilunar valves into which blood returning to the heart flows, closing the valves.
- situations vacant — Situations Vacant is the title of a column or page in a newspaper where jobs are advertised.
- sleep deprivation — a condition in which you have not had enough sleep
- sodium-vapor lamp — an electric lamp in which sodium vapor is activated by current passing between two electrodes, producing a yellow, glareless light: used on streets and highways.
- soil conservation — any of various methods to achieve the maximum utilization of the land and preserve its resources through such controls as crop rotation, prevention of soil erosion, etc.
- squash vine borer — the larva of a clearwing moth, Melittia satyriniformis, that bores into the stems of squash and related plants.
- state the obvious — point out sth already evident