Esikäsittelee

Esikäsittelee is the third-person singular present indicative form of the Finnish verb esikäsitellä, meaning to preprocess or pre-treat. The prefix esi- conveys the sense of “before” or “pre-,” while käsitellä means to handle or process. In this sense, esikäsittelee refers to performing preparatory processing on data, materials, or samples prior to the main step.

The term is commonly used in technical and scientific contexts. In computer science and data processing, esikäsittelee describes actions that prepare inputs for analysis, such as cleaning data, handling missing values, or normalizing data. In laboratory and manufacturing settings, it can refer to preparing materials or samples before measurements, experiments, or production steps. Examples include: “Ohjelmisto esikäsittelee syötteet ennen varsinaista analyysiä” and “Näytteet esikäsitellään ennen mikroskooppista mittausta.”

Morphology and related forms: esikäsittelee is a finite verb form; related forms include esikäsitellä (infinitive), esikäsittely (preprocessing or pretreatment), and esikäsittelijä (preprocessor, a person or software component). The past passive participle is esikäsitelty.

Etymology: the word combines esi- (prefix meaning before) with käsitellä (to handle or to process), forming a term used to describe preparatory processing steps. In Finnish technical writing, esikäsittelee and its related forms help distinguish preparatory operations from the main processing stage. See also esikäsittely, esikäsittelijä, käsittely.