# Using mathematical symbols alpha, beta, implies in latex

How can I use the mathematical symbols like alpha, beta, implies and many more symbols in the tex file?

• Use the math mode $\alpha,\beta$ – Sigur Dec 10 '14 at 15:55
• You can learn more about math and LaTeX in Herberts mathmode. – Johannes_B Dec 10 '14 at 15:56
• Hello! I hope I won't sound harsh, but from your question it seems to me that you lack some basic LaTeX knowledge. I would like to suggest you to take reasonable amount of time and learn the crucial basics, for good resources see What are good learning resources for a LaTeX beginner?. – yo' Dec 10 '14 at 15:59
• ‘implies’ is \Rightarrow. – Bernard Dec 10 '14 at 16:14
• @Bernard or \implies ;) – yo' Dec 10 '14 at 16:15

## 2 Answers

LaTeX needs to know beforehand that the subsequent text does indeed contain mathematical elements. This is because LaTeX typesets maths notation differently from normal text. Therefore, special environments have been declared for this purpose.

Greek letters are commonly used in mathematics, and they are very easy to type in math mode. You just have to type the name of the letter after a backslash: if the first letter is lowercase, you will get a lowercase Greek letter, if the first letter is uppercase (and only the first letter), then you will get an uppercase letter. Note that some uppercase Greek letters look like Latin ones, so they are not provided by LaTeX (e.g. uppercase Alpha and Beta are just "A" and "B" respectively). Lowercase epsilon, theta, kappa, phi, pi, rho, and sigma are provided in two different versions. The alternate, or variant, version is created by adding "var" before the name of the letter:

\alpha, A, \beta, B, \gamma, \Gamma, \pi, \Pi, \phi, \varphi, \Phi

See more in: http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/LaTeX/Mathematics

• You might mention that mathmode is invoked inline with \$ or $$, $$ delimiters, and on a separate line with $, $ delimiters, as well as various math environments. Welcome to the site. – Steven B. Segletes Dec 10 '14 at 16:16

You might want to try the "amsmath" package. Use \usepackage{amsmath} in the preamble of your document. Then one way to get an equation with greek letter is:

$$\label{eq1} \alpha + \beta_1$$

• Don't give labels like eq1. describe the contents in a keyword, like \label{eq:alphaBetaSum}. – Johannes_B Dec 10 '14 at 16:02