ZEN core 3.13

Base Software

The Global Toolbar offers you a quick overview of the microscope's status, providing you control over motorized components such as the stage, focus, and objective changer. You can access the toolbar in both Free and Job Mode.

A new Run Experiment Workbench enables you the execution of experiments without a user interface, facilitating streamlined automation. You can save the experiments on the available acquisition workbenches to the archive.

2D Toolkit

Added a selection menu in the Segmentation step of the Image Analysis Wizard to improve usability: A dialog provides you a picture of a typical use case and descriptive text for available segmentation options, including AI solutions.

AI Toolkit

Added an information in the segmentation steps of the 2D Toolkit and applicable Materials Apps, respectively, notifying you that models trained on images with different pixel types or different channel structure than the currently selected image will not be displayed in the model selection drop-down.

Docker Desktop is required to use instance segmentation models trained on arivis Cloud for image segmentation in ZEN Toolkit 2D or ZEN Toolkit Material Apps (“AI ready”). Docker Desktop is available from the ZEISS Microscopy Installer.

Developer Toolkit

The method for interacting with Microsoft Excel through the .NET framework has been updated to improve compatibility and performance. The previous approach for opening and manipulating Microsoft Excel has been replaced with a more robust method using
System.Type.GetTypeFromProgID and System.Activator.CreateInstance.

• Old code:
  import clr
  New code (ZEN core 3.13.onwards):
  import clr
  import System

• Old code:
  clr.AddReference("Microsoft.Office.Interop.Excel")
  import Microsoft.Office.Interop.Excel as Excel
  New code (ZEN core 3.13.onwards):
  clr.AddReference("Microsoft.Office.Interop.Excel")

• Old code:
  excel_application = Excel.ApplicationClass()
  excel_application.visible = True
  New code (ZEN core 3.13.onwards):
  import Microsoft.Office.Interop.Excel as Excel
  excel_type = System.Type.GetTypeFromProgID("Excel.Application")
  excel_app = System.Activator.CreateInstance(excel_type)
  excel_app.Visible = True

• Old code:
  workbook = excel_application.Workbooks.Add()
  worksheet = workbook.ActiveSheet
  New code (ZEN core 3.13.onwards):
  workbook = excel_app.Workbooks.Add()
  worksheet = workbook.ActiveSheet

Review and update any scripts relying on the previous code structure to use Microsoft Excel.

Technical Cleanliness Analysis (TCA)

Efficiency increase: added a pretrained Intellesis Object Classification Model for classification of Mica particles. Mica particles are silicate minerals with high temperature resistance and occur in the battery manufacturing process. Because of their shiny appearance they are often misclassified by default as “metallic-shiny” particles. The new introduced pretrained Mica ML-Model supports the classification of non-transparent Mica particles by default as “non shiny”. The model is also well suited for the detection of metallic and other non-metallic particles.

Usability improvement: For the TCA loaded image workflows a polarization orientation switch is now available in Edit View as part of the Size Distribution View. The switch enables you to inspect particles in two-channel-images with the applied polarization orientation used for acquisition. The switch is also available in the archived particle document.

Battery Inspection: For battery inspection the total equivalent particle area calculation is added. The calculation table and resulting Ne is shown in the TCA report (Component Cleanliness) when selected and saved to the archive by default.

Standard Update: The VDA 19.1 standard was updated to the current version and offers the total fiber length, a deviation calculation for the occupancy rate and job templates for the Extended/Free Analysis.

TCA reporting: Added an option for the selection of classification tables with or without displaying the size classes in addition to the letter code for the size classes. Added an option for the selection of classification tables with or without displaying the size classes in addition to the letter code for the size classes.

Non-Metallic Inclusion Analysis (NMI)

Standard-related updates.

ASTM E45 was updated to the latest revision (2025). The newest standard version offers mainly editorial changes; the inclusion formation and methods calculation are not changed.

Oversized inclusions are now documented in the report with an additional table. This is valid for ASTM E45, ISO 4967, JIS G 0555 and GB/T 10561.

The minimum inclusion width was changed to a minimum value 2 in the corresponding NMI standard templates for ISO 4967, JIS G 0555 and GB/T 10561.

SEM Deconvolution

The new SEM Deconvolution Toolkit is available in ZEN analyzer allowing you to enhance the clarity and detail of acquired electron microscopy images on offline workstations.

Axiocam ERc v2
O-INSPECT duo
SEM/Crossbeam

The Axiocam ERc v2 is not supported anymore with ZEN core 3.13. The driver support has been discontinued and you cannot use the camera anymore in the newest ZEN core version.

ZEN core 3.13 is not yet released for the O-INSPECT duo! ZEN core 3.11 is the currently released version for the O-INSPECT duo. Please do not upgrade to ZEN core 3.13 until further notice.

The ZEN core 3.13 SEM profile has been tested and is released only for SEM/Crossbeam systems with hASAP scan generator. When upgrading older systems, you must take the corresponding hardware upgrade into account.