化 is one of the most productive suffixes in modern Chinese - it turns nouns and adjectives into verbs meaning 'to become / make X' (compare English '-ize' or '-ify'). Examples:
个人化 ('personalize'),
现代化 ('modernize'),
简化 ('simplify'),
自动化 ('automate'),
国际化 ('internationalize'). Often translated as both verb and noun in English.
