Lexical analysis of technical terms in the field of materials science

Abstract

Abstract The article presents lexico-morphological analysis of terminology in the research articles on materials science. The article considers lexical features distinguished in scientific texts. The main purpose of the paper is to reveal the most frequent and productive types of word formation used in making specialized words and terms in technical English. For carrying out the linguistic study the analysis of the immediate constituents has been applied. Special attention is given to affixation, composition and contraction as the means of forming new words in the materials science engineering. Compounding or composition has been regarded as an important source of forming new words. Compound adjectives functioning as attributes are found to be primarily used for describing materials physical and chemical properties, conditions and stages of the experiments. Derivational units include borrowed and native productive or non-productive frequent affixes connected with different scientific notions. The study has been carried out on the technical terms and vocabulary from the journals “Advanced engineering materials” and “Advanced composite materials”.