18-letter words containing a, v, e, r
- over and done with — If you say that something is over and done with, you mean that it is completely finished and you do not have to think about it any more.
- over-extrapolation — to infer (an unknown) from something that is known; conjecture.
- over-pronunciation — to pronounce (a word, syllable, etc.) in an exaggerated, affected, or excessively careful manner.
- overcapitalization — The state of being overcapitalized.
- overdraft facility — a facility (of a bank or building-society cheque account) that allows a withdrawal of money in excess of the account's credit balance
- overdraft interest — interest charged on money withdrawn in excess of the credit balance of a bank or building society account
- overgeneralization — the act or process of overgeneralizing.
- overhead projector — over one's head; aloft; up in the air or sky, especially near the zenith: There was a cloud overhead.
- overidentification — an act or instance of identifying; the state of being identified.
- overinterpretation — the act of interpreting; elucidation; explication: This writer's work demands interpretation.
- overnight telegram — a type of domestic telegram sent at a reduced rate with a minimum charge for 10 words or less and accepted until midnight for delivery the following day.
- overpressurization — pressure in excess of normal atmospheric pressure, as that caused by an explosion's shock wave or created in an accelerating airplane.
- overrepresentation — to give too much representation to; represent in numbers that are disproportionately high.
- overspecialization — excessive specialization, as in a field of study.
- parallel evolution — the independent development of closely corresponding adaptive features in two or more groups of organisms that occupy different but equivalent habitats, as marsupial mammals in Australia and placental mammals on other continents.
- partial derivative — the derivative of a function with respect to one of its variables with all other variables held constant.
- partial evaluation — (compiler, algorithm) (Or "specialisation") An optimisation technique where the compiler evaluates some subexpressions at compile-time. For example, Partial evaluation might change the termination properties of the program if, for example, the expression (x * 0) was reduced to 0 it would terminate even if x (and thus x * 0) did not. It may be necessary to reorder an expression to partially evaluate it, e.g. f x y = (x + y) + 1 g z = f 3 z If we rewrite f: f x y = (x + 1) + y then the expression x+1 becomes a constant for the function g and we can say g z = f 3 z = (3 + 1) + z = 4 + z Partial evaluation of built-in functions applied to constant arguments is known as constant folding. See also full laziness.
- partial-vegetarian — a person who eats mostly plant foods, dairy products, and eggs, and occasionally chicken, fish, and red meat.
- particular average — a loss at sea, as through accident or negligence, that is borne solely by the owner of the lost property. Abbreviation: P.A.
- passive resistance — opposition to a government or to specific governmental laws by the use of noncooperation and other nonviolent methods, as economic boycotts and protest marches.
- passive vocabulary — all the words, collectively, that a person can understand
- passive-aggressive — denoting or pertaining to a personality type or behavior marked by the expression of negative emotions in passive, indirect ways, as through manipulation or noncooperation: a passive-aggressive employee who often misses deadlines.
- pave the way (for) — to prepare the way (for); facilitate the introduction (of)
- pemphigus vulgaris — a potentially fatal blistering skin disease, characterized by large blisters on the skin, mucous membranes of the mouth, genitals, intestines, etc, which eventually rupture and form painful denuded areas from which critical amounts of bodily protein, fluid, and blood may be lost
- physical inventory — To carry out a physical inventory is to count all the stock on hand.
- pneumatic conveyor — a tube through which powdered or granular material, such as cement, grain, etc is transported by a flow of air
- positively charged — having a positive charge
- post-revolutionary — of, pertaining to, characterized by, or of the nature of a revolution, or a sudden, complete, or marked change: a revolutionary junta.
- postviral syndrome — debilitating condition occurring as a sequel to viral illness
- prepositional verb — a combination of verb and preposition, often with idiomatic meaning, differing from other phrasal verbs in that an object must always follow the preposition, as take after in The children take after their mother.
- preservation order — In Britain, a preservation order is an official order that makes it illegal for anyone to alter or destroy something such as an old building or an area of countryside.
- private enterprise — free enterprise (def 1).
- provascular tissue — procambium.
- provision merchant — a person or company in the business of retailing food and other provisions
- psychogalvanometer — a type of galvanometer for detecting and measuring psychogalvanic currents.
- quality of service — (communications, networking) (QoS) The performance properties of a network service, possibly including throughput, transit delay, priority. Some protocols allow packets or streams to include QoS requirements.
- quantity surveying — the action or profession of a person who estimates the cost of the materials and labour necessary for a construction job
- quarter-wave plate — a crystal thin enough to cause a phase difference of 90° between the ordinary and extraordinary rays of polarized light, thereby converting circularly polarized light into plane polarized light.
- rabbit-foot clover — a plant, Trifolium arvense, having trifoliate leaves with narrow leaflets and fuzzy, cylindrical, grayish-pink flower heads.
- racially motivated — motivated by (the hate or prejudice of) someone's race
- radioactive dating — any method of determining the age of earth materials or objects of organic origin based on measurement of either short-lived radioactive elements or the amount of a long-lived radioactive element plus its decay product.
- radioactive series — a succession of elements initiated in the radioactive decay of a parent, as thorium or uranium, each of which decays into the next until a stable element, usually lead, is produced.
- raffinate recovery — Raffinate recovery is the use of a substance which is left after a process is complete and the desired substances have been removed.
- rapid eye movement — rapidly shifting, continuous movements of the eyes beneath closed lids during the stage of sleep characterized by dreaming.
- reactive component — the component in an alternating-current circuit that does not contribute power because it is 90° out of phase with the voltage or current.
- recovery operation — the process of locating and retrieving bodies, esp following an explosion or natural disaster
- redevelopment area — an urban area in which all or most of the buildings are demolished and rebuilt
- relative frequency — the ratio of the number of times an event occurs to the number of occasions on which it might occur in the same period.
- relative major key — a major key that has the same key signature as a minor key, but a different tonic
- relative minor key — a minor key that has the same key signature as a major key, but a different tonic