Unexplained whitespace in ylabel

I am trying to create a figure like follows, with the mu character included (similar behaviour for superscripts)

figure
plot(1:100)
ylabel('deviation from target [\mum]', 'interpreter','tex');
set(gcf,'PaperUnits', 'inches');
set(gcf,'PaperPositionMode', 'auto');
set(gcf,'PaperSize',[10,10]);
print('test_image','-depsc')

The when inspecting the generated .eps I see a large whitespace between the square bracket and the mu. I have attached the resulting image (converted it to pdf but the y-axis label looks the same as in .eps).

Any idea what causes this and how to remove it?

EDIT: I am on Ubuntu 18.04

Answer 1

[Walter Roberson]

https://www.mathworks.com/matlabcentral/answers/290136-unwanted-whitespace-gap-in-figure-text-before-symbols-and-subscripts-in-matlab-2015a-for-pdf-and-e which leads to https://www.mathworks.com/support/bugreports/1165657 -- this can occur with Painters renderer.

Historically there was also https://www.mathworks.com/matlabcentral/answers/159509-eps-export-problems-in-r2014b

That said, as soon as I read your original question, I said to myself, "Postscript. Linux" as I have seen similar questions before that were Linux related. I cannot seem to find the links at the moment. My memory is suggesting "Font problems" -- that is, that the page description being generated involves a font that you do not have installed in your renderer. Some people have gotten around that by editing the pdf.

Answer 2

[per isakson]

Here I don't see that space. I use Windows 10, Matlab R2018b and Acrobat Pro DC.

[Jonas Hongisto]

Sorry should have specified, I am on ubuntu 18.04. I've added this to my question.