rus
Issue #2/2022
A.A.Trukhova, A.S.Filonov, I.V.Yaminsky
THE WORDS AND GLORY OF PROBE MICROSCOPY: LANGUAGE WILL TAKE YOU TO BEIJING
THE WORDS AND GLORY OF PROBE MICROSCOPY: LANGUAGE WILL TAKE YOU TO BEIJING
DOI: https://doi.org/10.22184/1993-8578.2022.15.2.88.94
In this paper we will not talk about the instruments, but about the language of the scanning probe microscopy software: the words used, the terms and the notation. The FemtoScan Online software is widely used in the scientific community and, until recently, was available in two languages: Russian and English. FemtoScan Online is now also available in Chinese, the most widely spoken language in the world. In this paper we will tell you how the interface was translated. In 1990, Nobel laureate Heinrich Rohrer visited Moscow State University. A photograph and memories of the charm of this remarkable scientist and man are left as a memento. There is also a dedicatory inscription "I wish all the best in local probing". In 1990 the term "scanning probe microscopy" or its Russian equivalent had not yet appeared. In 1993 a series of papers was published in the journal "Electronic Industry" where we described the methods of local surface sensing [1]. The short triad "scanning probe microscopy" appeared later.
In this paper we will not talk about the instruments, but about the language of the scanning probe microscopy software: the words used, the terms and the notation. The FemtoScan Online software is widely used in the scientific community and, until recently, was available in two languages: Russian and English. FemtoScan Online is now also available in Chinese, the most widely spoken language in the world. In this paper we will tell you how the interface was translated. In 1990, Nobel laureate Heinrich Rohrer visited Moscow State University. A photograph and memories of the charm of this remarkable scientist and man are left as a memento. There is also a dedicatory inscription "I wish all the best in local probing". In 1990 the term "scanning probe microscopy" or its Russian equivalent had not yet appeared. In 1993 a series of papers was published in the journal "Electronic Industry" where we described the methods of local surface sensing [1]. The short triad "scanning probe microscopy" appeared later.
Теги: automatic translation femtoscan online nanoscope scanning probe microscope scanning tunnel microscope автоматизированный перевод наноскоп сканирующая зондовая микроскопия сканирующий туннельный микроскоп фемтоскан онлайн
INTRODUCTION
Scanning probe microscopy is the wonder and joy of new discoveries. Scanning probe microscopy is a new research opportunity, a wonderful world of wide-range experimental facilities and instruments.
The first of the family of scanning probe microscopes was the scanning tunneling microscope. It was in 1981 when Gerd Binnig and Heinrich Rohrer used an experimental setup they created to record the exponential dependence of tunnel current on distance. In 1986 they were awarded the Nobel Prize for Physics for the invention of the tunnelling microscope. In the same year Gerd Binnig was involved in the development of the atomic force microscope.
How rich is the modern language of the scanning probe microscopy? We managed to get the answer with a certain degree of completeness recently when we started to translate the FemtoScan Online software into Chinese. The active phase of FemtoScan Online development started in 1996 and has been continuing for twenty-six years [2–5]. During this time over one hundred different measuring modes were introduced to the FemtoScan microscope and a professional communication language was formed. Now the FemtoScan Online software is already available in three languages: Russian, Chinese and English.
To localise FemtoScan Online into Chinese, about 70 XML files had to be translated. As it is known, they are responsible for the program interface. It was necessary to translate all Russian words in the file. They were responsible for the names of buttons and descriptions of the program functions. It was decided to simplify the task and use the Python programming language. Such automation saved more than three hours.
If you take a closer look, you’ll notice that the words and phrases that need to be translated are either within or between tags. A tag is a special reserved word enclosed in angle brackets (e.g. <body>). This helped to build the logic of the program for translation.
All files must be reformatted to .txt format for the software to operate correctly, which does not damage the file in any way and present no problems when converting back to xml format.
Each file is handled in turn. The program is designed for classic files describing the interface and having no more than three words in a row in one sentence. The obvious disadvantage is that there is no possibility to translate abbreviated words due to the specific nature of automatic translation. It is therefore necessary to manually correct them to their full form.
Here is a brief description of how the program works. After reading a file, word processing takes place in several steps. First, it reads all the words between the tags and puts them into a list. Then it detects all Cyrillic words inside the tags and attributes. The maximum number of words inside the tags is three. Therefore, at first the phrases of three words are searched and uploaded to the list, then the phrases of two and one. As the search for 2 and 1 words finds words from phrases containing 3 or 2 words, an overlap check is performed.
The googletrans library was used for auto-translation. It integrates Google Translate API into our program [6]. The program translates a list of phrases and words that we have compiled, and puts the translated units into a new list. Then we replace all Cyrillic words in the source file with their corresponding translated words. The output is a translated file in the preffered language.
The automated translation has its advantages and disadvantages that cannot be ignored. The main disadvantage is inaccuracy of the translation, especially with regard to specialised terms and stable, but rather uncommon expressions. If possible, verification should therefore be carried out with the help of experts who are familiar with the language in question.
Below you can see a diagram where you can visually estimate the ratio of "suitable files", files with phrases longer than 3 words and files with abbreviations. It is obvious that automation has greatly accelerated and simplified the process, since the "suitable" files are still in the majority.
The automated translation is renowned for its speed, cheapness and convenience. Such tools are gaining popularity and will soon help to instantly spread the latest developments around the world.
Here is a list of the most popular terms used in FemtoScan software:
WLC analysis is a function that provides direct analysis and curve parameters in the persistence model approximation of the polymer chain.
Autocorrelation is an operation for "Line" or "Curve" menus.
Auto update is an operation in the "View" menu. If this operation is marked, the image is automatically updated.
Analysis of selected areas is an operation in the "Mathematics" menu. It is used to determine the perimeter, projection and surface area of objects, as well as their volume from the selected surface area.
Grain analysis is an operation in the "Mathematics" menu. Allows you to analyse the grains.
Object analysis is an operation on the "Mathematics" menu. It allows to automatically select objects, calculate their spatial characteristics, and analyse them using a histogram.
Power curve analysis is an operation in the "Curve" menu. Calculates automatically the power curve parameters such as the slope of the linear (elastic) part of the power curve and the value of the minimum force.
Roughness Analysis is a function on the "Mathematics" menu. Allows you to calculate a set of parameters that describe the surface roughness in a selected area or in the whole image.
Arithmetic is an operation in the "Mathematics" menu. Allows you to perform simple image operations: sum – addition, difference – subtraction, complex operation – addition with offset.
Interference pattern height. This function is used to measure steepness of the growth spike on the crystal surface from the interference pattern recorded with an optical microscope.
Alignment is a "Mathematics" menu operation. Allows you to get rid of an overall slope (or bulge) in the image.
Histogram is a function in the "Operations" menu. Plots the distribution of surface image points by height.
Probe modelling is a function in the "Mathematics" menu. It allows to create and simulate different probe shapes (conical, complex conical, pyramidal, whisker) according to some known geometrical parameters. Subsequently, the created probe images can be used for the "Expansion" and "Erosion" morphological filters.
Median Filter is an operation on the "Mathematics" menu that implements a square mask median filter with an arbitrary side length.
Median X is an operation on the "Mathematics" menu that implements median filtering with a 3 × 3 grid mask, in the centre of which the point to be processed is located.
Median Cross Filter is an operation on the "Mathematics" menu that implements median filtering with a 3 × 3 cross-shaped mask, with the processed point in the centre.
Build 3D is a command on the "Operations" menu. It allows to build a three dimensional image of the surface.
Increase Sharpness is an operation on the "Mathematics" menu. It allows you to emphasise the differences between the adjacent pixel shades and the highlight subtle details.
Wiener Filter is a function in the "Mathematics" menu. It allows to remove the random noise present in an image using the Wiener Filter method with an arbitrarily sized mask.
Fourier is a function in the "Operations" menu. It allows to get a representation of a 2D image in Fourier space (builds a Fourier image).
These and many other operations can be used to process AFM images and analyse their structure. By applying various processing methods correctly, a great deal of additional information can be obtained. This is why it is so important to correctly convey the exact meaning of terms in translation. This is the difference between scientific translation and literary translation. While in everyday language a word can have many meanings, in scientific terminology meaning of the word is unambiguous, and its exact one is to be used in translation.
SUMMARY
Funny things have also happened with terminology in SPM. In 1992–1993 we carried out joint measurements in Stockholm with the Royal Institute of Technology. This resulted in interesting observations on titanium oxidation. A presentable article was published in a reputable journal [7]. On our return home, Sheremetyevo airport customs arrested our atomic force microscope Scan-8, saying that if it was atomic, we had to get permission to import it from the departments of the atomic industry, and since it was also power, then from the law enforcement agencies – Ministry of Internal Affairs and Ministry of Defense. "Wait," we said. – "And how did you authorise us to take it abroad earlier?". The customs office thought and let us back freely along with the microscope.
In the 1990s, a US company registered the trademark NanoScope to refer to an electronic microscope unit. The mechanical system had the slightly cumbersome name MMAFM (multimode atomic force microscope). Of course, many users began to use the short NanoScope to refer to both the mechanics and electronics, and the microscope itself in general. In Russian the word nanoscope has caught on not only to name probe microscopes, but also high-resolution optical microscopes.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
A lot of time, effort and money went into creating the FemtoScan Online software. In 2022 the work is supported by the RFBR and London Royal Society, Project No. 21-58-10005, the RFBR, Project No. 20-32-90036, the Russian Science Foundation project No. 20-12-00389, and from the Foundation for the Promotion of Innovation, Project No. 71108.
PEER REVIEW INFO
Editorial board thanks the anonymous reviewer(s) for their contribution to the peer review of this work. It is also grateful for their consent to publish papers on the journal’s website and SEL eLibrary eLIBRARY.RU.
Declaration of Competing Interest. The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper.
Scanning probe microscopy is the wonder and joy of new discoveries. Scanning probe microscopy is a new research opportunity, a wonderful world of wide-range experimental facilities and instruments.
The first of the family of scanning probe microscopes was the scanning tunneling microscope. It was in 1981 when Gerd Binnig and Heinrich Rohrer used an experimental setup they created to record the exponential dependence of tunnel current on distance. In 1986 they were awarded the Nobel Prize for Physics for the invention of the tunnelling microscope. In the same year Gerd Binnig was involved in the development of the atomic force microscope.
How rich is the modern language of the scanning probe microscopy? We managed to get the answer with a certain degree of completeness recently when we started to translate the FemtoScan Online software into Chinese. The active phase of FemtoScan Online development started in 1996 and has been continuing for twenty-six years [2–5]. During this time over one hundred different measuring modes were introduced to the FemtoScan microscope and a professional communication language was formed. Now the FemtoScan Online software is already available in three languages: Russian, Chinese and English.
To localise FemtoScan Online into Chinese, about 70 XML files had to be translated. As it is known, they are responsible for the program interface. It was necessary to translate all Russian words in the file. They were responsible for the names of buttons and descriptions of the program functions. It was decided to simplify the task and use the Python programming language. Such automation saved more than three hours.
If you take a closer look, you’ll notice that the words and phrases that need to be translated are either within or between tags. A tag is a special reserved word enclosed in angle brackets (e.g. <body>). This helped to build the logic of the program for translation.
All files must be reformatted to .txt format for the software to operate correctly, which does not damage the file in any way and present no problems when converting back to xml format.
Each file is handled in turn. The program is designed for classic files describing the interface and having no more than three words in a row in one sentence. The obvious disadvantage is that there is no possibility to translate abbreviated words due to the specific nature of automatic translation. It is therefore necessary to manually correct them to their full form.
Here is a brief description of how the program works. After reading a file, word processing takes place in several steps. First, it reads all the words between the tags and puts them into a list. Then it detects all Cyrillic words inside the tags and attributes. The maximum number of words inside the tags is three. Therefore, at first the phrases of three words are searched and uploaded to the list, then the phrases of two and one. As the search for 2 and 1 words finds words from phrases containing 3 or 2 words, an overlap check is performed.
The googletrans library was used for auto-translation. It integrates Google Translate API into our program [6]. The program translates a list of phrases and words that we have compiled, and puts the translated units into a new list. Then we replace all Cyrillic words in the source file with their corresponding translated words. The output is a translated file in the preffered language.
The automated translation has its advantages and disadvantages that cannot be ignored. The main disadvantage is inaccuracy of the translation, especially with regard to specialised terms and stable, but rather uncommon expressions. If possible, verification should therefore be carried out with the help of experts who are familiar with the language in question.
Below you can see a diagram where you can visually estimate the ratio of "suitable files", files with phrases longer than 3 words and files with abbreviations. It is obvious that automation has greatly accelerated and simplified the process, since the "suitable" files are still in the majority.
The automated translation is renowned for its speed, cheapness and convenience. Such tools are gaining popularity and will soon help to instantly spread the latest developments around the world.
Here is a list of the most popular terms used in FemtoScan software:
WLC analysis is a function that provides direct analysis and curve parameters in the persistence model approximation of the polymer chain.
Autocorrelation is an operation for "Line" or "Curve" menus.
Auto update is an operation in the "View" menu. If this operation is marked, the image is automatically updated.
Analysis of selected areas is an operation in the "Mathematics" menu. It is used to determine the perimeter, projection and surface area of objects, as well as their volume from the selected surface area.
Grain analysis is an operation in the "Mathematics" menu. Allows you to analyse the grains.
Object analysis is an operation on the "Mathematics" menu. It allows to automatically select objects, calculate their spatial characteristics, and analyse them using a histogram.
Power curve analysis is an operation in the "Curve" menu. Calculates automatically the power curve parameters such as the slope of the linear (elastic) part of the power curve and the value of the minimum force.
Roughness Analysis is a function on the "Mathematics" menu. Allows you to calculate a set of parameters that describe the surface roughness in a selected area or in the whole image.
Arithmetic is an operation in the "Mathematics" menu. Allows you to perform simple image operations: sum – addition, difference – subtraction, complex operation – addition with offset.
Interference pattern height. This function is used to measure steepness of the growth spike on the crystal surface from the interference pattern recorded with an optical microscope.
Alignment is a "Mathematics" menu operation. Allows you to get rid of an overall slope (or bulge) in the image.
Histogram is a function in the "Operations" menu. Plots the distribution of surface image points by height.
Probe modelling is a function in the "Mathematics" menu. It allows to create and simulate different probe shapes (conical, complex conical, pyramidal, whisker) according to some known geometrical parameters. Subsequently, the created probe images can be used for the "Expansion" and "Erosion" morphological filters.
Median Filter is an operation on the "Mathematics" menu that implements a square mask median filter with an arbitrary side length.
Median X is an operation on the "Mathematics" menu that implements median filtering with a 3 × 3 grid mask, in the centre of which the point to be processed is located.
Median Cross Filter is an operation on the "Mathematics" menu that implements median filtering with a 3 × 3 cross-shaped mask, with the processed point in the centre.
Build 3D is a command on the "Operations" menu. It allows to build a three dimensional image of the surface.
Increase Sharpness is an operation on the "Mathematics" menu. It allows you to emphasise the differences between the adjacent pixel shades and the highlight subtle details.
Wiener Filter is a function in the "Mathematics" menu. It allows to remove the random noise present in an image using the Wiener Filter method with an arbitrarily sized mask.
Fourier is a function in the "Operations" menu. It allows to get a representation of a 2D image in Fourier space (builds a Fourier image).
These and many other operations can be used to process AFM images and analyse their structure. By applying various processing methods correctly, a great deal of additional information can be obtained. This is why it is so important to correctly convey the exact meaning of terms in translation. This is the difference between scientific translation and literary translation. While in everyday language a word can have many meanings, in scientific terminology meaning of the word is unambiguous, and its exact one is to be used in translation.
SUMMARY
Funny things have also happened with terminology in SPM. In 1992–1993 we carried out joint measurements in Stockholm with the Royal Institute of Technology. This resulted in interesting observations on titanium oxidation. A presentable article was published in a reputable journal [7]. On our return home, Sheremetyevo airport customs arrested our atomic force microscope Scan-8, saying that if it was atomic, we had to get permission to import it from the departments of the atomic industry, and since it was also power, then from the law enforcement agencies – Ministry of Internal Affairs and Ministry of Defense. "Wait," we said. – "And how did you authorise us to take it abroad earlier?". The customs office thought and let us back freely along with the microscope.
In the 1990s, a US company registered the trademark NanoScope to refer to an electronic microscope unit. The mechanical system had the slightly cumbersome name MMAFM (multimode atomic force microscope). Of course, many users began to use the short NanoScope to refer to both the mechanics and electronics, and the microscope itself in general. In Russian the word nanoscope has caught on not only to name probe microscopes, but also high-resolution optical microscopes.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
A lot of time, effort and money went into creating the FemtoScan Online software. In 2022 the work is supported by the RFBR and London Royal Society, Project No. 21-58-10005, the RFBR, Project No. 20-32-90036, the Russian Science Foundation project No. 20-12-00389, and from the Foundation for the Promotion of Innovation, Project No. 71108.
PEER REVIEW INFO
Editorial board thanks the anonymous reviewer(s) for their contribution to the peer review of this work. It is also grateful for their consent to publish papers on the journal’s website and SEL eLibrary eLIBRARY.RU.
Declaration of Competing Interest. The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper.
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