# What is the round v symbol used by my thermodynamics text for volume and specific volume?

The shape is somewhere between a v and a u. I'm almost certain it's a letter character as they have both lower and uppercase (used for specific and total volume respectively).

Since the v and V characters are also used for things like voltage and velocity, it's important for me to be able to distinguish these.

The top six symbols below are what I want, the first four being lowercase and the next two being uppercase.

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Isn't it just the greek letter \nu? –  daleif Jun 6 '13 at 14:29
@daleif, I don't know anything about thermodynamics, but the capital \nu is just N... don't know if that's the character the OP wanted? –  long tom Jun 6 '13 at 14:34
maybe it's possible to post an example of the capital character, too? –  long tom Jun 6 '13 at 14:36
It's definitely not \nu. The nomenclature section of the textbook lists the greek letter symbols separately. \nu is used for the "stoichiometric coefficient". –  MalcolmOcean Jun 6 '13 at 14:37
Isn't it a "v"? –  egreg Jun 6 '13 at 14:38

Much to my surprise, WhattheFont found the pretty close match and this is the result from ITC Benguiat Gothic.

I have to put a disclaimer here that I'm quite surprised that the inner join is left like that. And the designer is a famous font designer so either I have zero taste or else....

As I've commented (and deleted for this answer) it looks like a two-path TikZ picture with round cap. So... yeah...

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That is so random. I mean, I appreciate their effort in distinguishing the various Vs, but it's very confusing. –  MalcolmOcean Jun 6 '13 at 16:50
Anyway, I take it there's no way to just use this character in my LaTeX equations in Anki decks... I guess since they're for my own purposes I'll just use an accent or something. –  MalcolmOcean Jun 6 '13 at 16:51

Edit: It's a \nu. There might be differences in the nomenclature, but if I recall correctly, \nu is the variable for the specific volume.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Specific_volume

Whatthefont.com says the letter is a capital V from the typeface ITC Benguiat Gothic.
It's not a \nu you can compare the left branches of both. –  percusse Jun 6 '13 at 15:05
The only option left is \vee, but that doesn't quite fit either. So I stay with \nu. –  Eekhoorn Jun 6 '13 at 15:11
@percusse I can confirm that the right symbol for the specific volume is \nu and the symbol for the volume is a capital V (in thermodynamics). Probably the author didn't know how to dinstinguish different quantities and used those symbols (it seems a MS Word document) –  karlkoeller Jun 6 '13 at 15:14
@karlkoeller I can confirm that too but the character is not \nu. –  percusse Jun 6 '13 at 15:16
it is definitely not a \nu; see the nist document Guide for the Use of the International System of Units (SI), p.28, section 8.6.9. the symbols are cap V (total volume) and lowercase v (specific volume), both italic. (it's traditional to use the same letter, cap and lowercase, to represent closely related concepts.) since there's a conflict with voltage (bold upright V) and velocity (cap italic V) in the document used as a reference in the initial question, i think the choice of italic sans v and V is a good one. –  barbara beeton Jun 6 '13 at 16:42