What is "transcription"

Transcription \Tran*scrip"tion\ (tr[a^]n*skr[i^]p"sh[u^]n), n.

1. The act or process of transcribing, or copying; as, corruptions creep into books by repeated transcriptions.

2. A copy; a transcript.
   --Walton.

3. (Mus.) An arrangement of a composition for some other instrument or voice than that for which it was originally written, as the translating of a song, a vocal or instrumental quartet, or even an orchestral work, into a piece for the piano; an adaptation; an arrangement; -- a name applied by modern composers for the piano to a more or less fanciful and ornate reproduction on their own instrument of a song or other piece not originally intended for it; as, Liszt's transcriptions of songs by Schubert.

1590s, from Middle French transcription, from Late Latin transcriptionem (nominative transcriptio), noun of action from past participle stem of transcribere (see transcribe). Biological sense is from 1961. Related: Transcriptional; transcriptionist.

n. 1 The act or process of transcribing. 2 Something that has been transcribed, including: 3 # (context music English) An adaptation of a composition. 4 # A recorded radio or television programme. 5 # (context linguistics English) A representation of speech sounds as phonetic symbols. 6 (context genetics English) The synthesis of RNA under the direction of DNA.

1. n. something written, especially copied from one medium to another, as a typewritten version of dictation [syn: written text]

2. (genetics) the organic process whereby the DNA sequence in a gene is copied into mRNA; the process whereby a base sequence of messenger RNA is synthesized on a template of complementary DNA

3. a sound or television recording (e.g., from a broadcast to a tape recording)

4. the act of arranging and adapting a piece of music [syn: arrangement, arranging]

5. the act of making a record (especially an audio record); "she watched the recording from a sound-proof booth" [syn: recording]

Transcription may refer to:

Transcription is a scientific journal published by Taylor & Francis focusing on the subject of the transcription of DNA. Its stated aim is to publish

Transcription is the first step of gene expression, in which a particular segment of DNA is copied into RNA ( mRNA) by the enzyme RNA polymerase. Both DNA and RNA are nucleic acids, which use base pairs of nucleotides as a complementary language. During transcription, a DNA sequence is read by an RNA polymerase, which produces a complementary, antiparallel RNA strand called a primary transcript.

Transcription proceeds in the following general steps:

1. RNA polymerase, together with one or more general transcription factor, binds to promoter DNA.
2. RNA polymerase creates a transcription bubble, which separates the two strands of the DNA helix. This is done by breaking the hydrogen bonds between complementary DNA nucleotides.
3. RNA polymerase adds RNA nucleotides (which are complementary to the nucleotides of one DNA strand).
4. RNA sugar-phosphate backbone forms with assistance from RNA polymerase to form an RNA strand.
5. Hydrogen bonds of the RNA–DNA helix break, freeing the newly synthesized RNA strand.
6. If the cell has a nucleus, the RNA may be further processed. This may include polyadenylation, capping, and splicing.
7. The RNA may remain in the nucleus or exit to the cytoplasm through the nuclear pore complex.

The stretch of DNA transcribed into an RNA molecule is called a transcription unit and encodes at least one gene. If the gene encodes a protein, the transcription produces messenger RNA (mRNA); the mRNA will in turn serve as a template for the protein's synthesis through translation. Alternatively, the transcribed gene may encode for either non-coding RNA (such as microRNA), ribosomal RNA (rRNA), transfer RNA (tRNA), or other enzymatic RNA molecules called ribozymes. Overall, RNA helps synthesize, regulate, and process proteins; it therefore plays a fundamental role in performing functions within a cell.

In virology, the term may also be used when referring to mRNA synthesis from an RNA molecule (i.e., RNA replication). For instance, the genome of a negative-sense single-stranded RNA (ssRNA -) virus may be template for a positive-sense single-stranded RNA (ssRNA +). This is because the positive-sense strand contains the information needed to translate the viral proteins for viral replication afterwards. This process is catalyzed by a viral RNA replicase.

Transcription in the linguistic sense is the systematic representation of language in written form. The source can either be utterances (speech or sign language) or preexisting text in another writing system.

Transcription should not be confused with translation, which means representing the meaning of a source language text in a target language (e.g. translating the meaning of an English text into Spanish), or with transliteration which means representing a text from one script in another (e.g. transliterating a Cyrillic text into the Latin script).

In the academic discipline of linguistics, transcription is an essential part of the methodologies of (among others) phonetics, conversation analysis, dialectology and sociolinguistics. It also plays an important role for several subfields of speech technology. Common examples for transcriptions outside academia are the proceedings of a court hearing such as a criminal trial (by a court reporter) or a physician's recorded voice notes ( medical transcription). This article focuses on transcription in linguistics.

In music, transcription can mean notating a piece or a sound which was previously unnotated, as, for example, an improvised jazz solo. When a musician is tasked with creating sheet music from a recording and they write down the notes that make up the song in music notation, it is said that they created a musical transcription of that recording. Transcription may also mean rewriting a piece of music, either solo or ensemble, for another instrument or other instruments than which it was originally intended. The Beethoven Symphonies by Franz Liszt are a good example. Transcription in this sense is sometimes called arrangement, although strictly speaking transcriptions are faithful adaptations, whereas arrangements change significant aspects of the original piece.

Further examples of music transcription include ethnomusicological notation of oral traditions of folk music, such as Béla Bartók's and Ralph Vaughan Williams' collections of the national folk music of Hungary and England respectively. The French composer Olivier Messiaen transcribed birdsong in the wild, and incorporated it into many of his compositions, for example his Catalogue d'oiseaux for solo piano. Transcription of this nature involves scale degree recognition and harmonic analysis, both of which the transcriber will need relative or perfect pitch to perform.

In popular music and rock, there are two forms of transcription. Individual performers copy a note-for-note guitar solo or other melodic line. As well, music publishers transcribe entire recordings of guitar solos and bass lines and sell the sheet music in bound books. Music publishers also publish PVG (piano/vocal/guitar) transcriptions of popular music, where the melody line is transcribed, and then the accompaniment on the recording is arranged as a piano part. The guitar aspect of the PVG label is achieved through guitar chords written above the melody. Lyrics are also included below the melody.

A transcription service is a business which converts speech (either live or recorded) into a written or electronic text document. Transcription services are often provided for business, legal, or medical purposes. The most common type of transcription is from a spoken-language source into text such as a computer file suitable for printing as a document such as a report. Common examples are the proceedings of a court hearing such as a criminal trial (by a court reporter) or a physician's recorded voice notes ( medical transcription). Some transcription businesses can send staff to events, speeches, or seminars, who then convert the spoken content into text. Some companies also accept recorded speech, either on cassette, CD, VHS, or as sound files. For a transcription service, various individuals and organisations have different rates and methods of pricing. That can be per line, per word, per minute, or per hour, which differs from individual to individual and industry to industry. Transcription companies primarily serve private law firms, local, state and federal government agencies and courts, trade associations, meeting planners and nonprofits.

Transcription is one of the fastest growing legitimate jobs in the US. Transcription work can be a good choice for people who are retired or who want to earn extra income by utilizing their free time.

Before 1970, transcription was a difficult job, as secretaries had to write down the speech as they heard it using advanced skills, like shorthand. They also had to be at the location where the service was required. But with the introduction of tape cassettes and portable recorders in the late 1970s, the work became much easier and new possibilities emerged. Cassettes can travel through internal mail or external mail which meant for the first time, the transcriptionists could have the work brought to them in their own office which could be in a different location or business. For the first time, transcriptionist could work from home for many different businesses at their own convenience, provided they met the deadlines required by their clients.

With the advanced technology of today, people can have almost anything transcribed very rapidly. An MP3-based Dictaphone, for example, can be used to record the sound. The recording can then be uploaded to a pc and emailed within minutes to someone who could be anywhere in the world. The transcriptionist can then replay the audio many times. The sound can also be filtered, equalised or have the tempo adjusted when the clarity is poor. The completed document can then be emailed back and printed out or incorporated into other documents – all within just a few hours of the original recording being made.

The industry standard for transcribing an audio file takes one hour for every 15 minutes of audio. For live usage, real-time text transcription services are available for captioning purposes, including Remote CART, Captioned Telephone, and live closed captioning during live broadcasts. Live transcripts are less accurate than offline transcripts, as there is no time for corrections and refinements. However, in a multistage subtitling process with a broadcast delay and access to a live audio feed it is possible to have several correction stages and for the text to be displayed at the same time as the "live" transmission.

There are two methods of transcription: dictation typing of correspondence and reports, and focus group and interview transcription.

Dictation typing is one person dictating and interview transcription is of two people or more.

Transcription software assists in the conversion of human speech into a text transcript. The primary meaning of the term "transcription software" has changed over time, with the introduction of new technologies such as natural language speech recognition. References also depend on the purpose for the transcript. The term "transcription software" can refer to a completely automated solution, or to software which helps a human transcriber manually convert spoken audio into text transcripts. In the latter case, the term digital dictation is sometimes used.

Transcription software, as with transcription services, is often provided for business, legal, or medical purposes. Compared with audio content, a text transcript is searchable, takes up less computer memory, and can be used as an alternate method of communication, such as for closed captions.

The definition of transcription "software", as compared with transcription "service", is that the former is sufficiently automated that a user can run the entire system without engaging outside personnel. However, the advent of software-as-a-service and cloud computing models blur this distinction.