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Smart Trams (Posted on 2012-04-26) Difficulty: 4 of 5
This is a variation of Elite Etile.

Consider all possible valid English words having at least 3 letters and at most 13 letters that satisfy the following conditions:
  • Each word ends with a letter that immediately follows the letter that the word begins with. (For example, if a word begins with c it must end in d), and:
  • Reversing the letters we obtain another valid English word, and:
  • None of the words can be proper nouns, acronyms or abbreviations, and:
  • None of the words can be hyphenated like A-bomb, X-ray etc.
What is the longest word that satisfies all the given conditions? What are the respective first word and the last word appearing alphabetically? Does there exist any valid English word having more than 13 letters that satisfies all the conditions?

No Solution Yet Submitted by K Sengupta    
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Solution solution | Comment 3 of 10 |
There are relatively few words that meet the given conditions.

(i) The longest word pairs I found in a dictionary are the two word pairs of seven-letter words:
  • reloops - the act of looping again
    spooler - one who, or that which, spools
  • reknits - the act of knitting again
    stinker - something or someone difficult or unpleasant
In addition are three word pairs of six-letter words:
  • recaps - summarizes briefly
    spacer - an empty or blank area
  • redips - the act of dipping again
    spider - an eight-legged creature
  • repins - the act of pinning again
    sniper - a marksman who shoots from concealment
In the following list are word pairs of shorter length that meet all but the condition of longest length. Note, some of the words that end in -s are both third-person singular simple present verbs as well as plural nouns. Due to the former condition they are included here:
  • arb - an arbiter
    bra - a brassiere
  • card - a piece of thick stiff paper
    drac - (Austrailian slang) unattractive
  • cod - a Northern Atlantic food fish
    doc - a doctor
  • dace - a small European freshwater fish
    ecad - organism whose form is environmentally affected
  • deke - a fake, intended to decieve the opponent
    eked - got with great effort or strain
  • flog - beat severly with a whip or rod
    golf - a game played on a usually large open course
  • keel - a longitudinal beam of a vessels hull
    leek - a slender onion-like vegetable
  • larum - an alarm
    mural - a very large image applied to a wall or ceiling
  • muton - smallest unit of DNA which mutation can occur
    notum - dorsal part of the thoracic segment of an insect
  • raps - strikes sharply and swiftly; snatches
    spar - fight in a short bout or practice; a pole
  • rats - snitches
    star - self-luminous celestial body; a famous performer 
  • rebus - representation of words using pictures/symbols
    suber - an outer tissue of bark; phellem
  • roots - grows or plants roots; originates; take sides with
    stoor - (Scottish) turmoil or conflict; dust; cloud of dust
  • snit - a state of agitated irritation
    tins - plates with tin; preserves in a can or tin
  • stat - with no delay; at once
    tats - makes lacework by knotting or looping
  • spat - a brief quarrel; had spit; a larval-staged mullosk
    taps - to touch gently or make a soft knocking sound
  • spit - to expectorate; spittle
    tips - tilts; gives a gratutity
  • spot - a stain, blot, mark or blemish; to sight
    tops - bests; places atop
  • swot - to study intensively
    tows - drags behind
(ii) Disregarding the usage of plurals the following other words meet the given conditions:
  • res - plural of re: 2nd note of the sol-fa scale
    ser - unit of weight 1/40 of a maund
  • retros - fashions reminiscent of the past
    sorter - something or someone who sorts things
  • rexes - plural of rex: an animal exhibiting a recessive genetic variation of short, sparse or a lack of guard hairs
    sexer - one specialized in chicken sexing
  • smut - a fungus; obscene material
    tums - plural of tum: tummy
  • swat - a sharp blow
    taws - pl. of taw: shooting marble; 23rd Hebrew letter
  • sit - to take a seat; rest;watch and care for a child
    tis - pl. of ti: 7th note of the sol-fa scale
I did find a few other words that met the requirements (two disregarding the plural restriction), yet one or both words of the word pairs are either outdated, archaic or obsolete:
  • bac - a broad, flatbottomed ferryboat; a vat or cistern
    cab - a taxi
  • deye - to die
    eyed - having an eyelike features; watched intensely
  • fig - a fleshy sweet pear-shaped fruit
    gif - if
  • oop - to bind with thread or cord; to join; to unite
    poo - feces; to defecate
  • redos - pl. of redo: the act doing something again
    soder - solder; to mend; to unite with fusible metal
  • rots - wastes away; breaks down
    stor - strong; powerful; hardy; bold
  • rooms - shares a room or house with one or more others
    smoor - to suffocate or smother
  • stut - to stutter
    tuts - pl. of tut: hassock

Edited on April 26, 2012, 1:08 pm
  Posted by Dej Mar on 2012-04-26 13:05:24

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