# Missing $inserted in a table for superscript I get the error message of missing$ inserted in my table.

\toprule
ABS & \ 14,573.300^a & 3 & 4,857.767 & 40.297 & .000 \\
\midrule


\toprule
ABS & $14,573.300^a$ & 3 & 4,857.767 & 40.297 & .000 \\
\midrule


Basically, i need put the figure below with subscript in my table

• The ^ particle should only ever be used in math mode. For the problem at hand, replace ^a with \textsuperscript{a} -- unless you're really trying to display "14573 to the a'th power"... – Mico Aug 8 at 14:56
• By the way, what is a supposed to denote? Is it a footnote marker? Please advise. – Mico Aug 8 at 15:01
• @Mico Yes, it will be a footnote marker for a – aan Aug 8 at 15:05
• Please provide complete small document not just code fragment ... see, if maybe use of the threeparttable can help you (it define \tnote for such purposes). – Zarko Aug 8 at 15:20
• why not use \footnotemark ? (or as Zarko just suggested a table notes macro?) – David Carlisle Aug 8 at 15:20

In TeX and LaTeX, the ^ symbol should only ever be used in math mode, to denote exponentiation. However, you're not really trying to typeset "14,573.000 to the a'th power", right?

• The brute-force solution would be to input 14,573.300\textsuperscript{a}. However, this approach doesn't exploit knowledge that a is supposed to be a footnote marker.

• A much better solution is to load the threepartable package and to use its \tnote macro to typeset the footnote markers; the markers can be letters, numbers, symbols, or what-have-you. And, use a tablenotes environment after the end of the tabular environment to typeset the footnote material itself.

A serious advantage of the latter approach is that the machinery of the threeparttable will automatically set the width of the tablenotes environment to that of the associated tabular environment.

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage{booktabs}
\usepackage[flushleft]{threeparttable}
\renewcommand{\TPTtagStyle}{\itshape} % optional
\usepackage{lipsum} % for filler text
\begin{document}

%% Approach 1: The brute-force method
\begin{table}[ht!]
\caption{A table}
\centering
\begin{tabular}{@{} *{6}{c} @{}}
\toprule
ABS & \ 14,573.300\textsuperscript{a} & 3 & 4,857.767 & 40.297 & .000 \\
\midrule
\end{tabular}
\end{table}

%% Approach 2: The intelligent method
\begin{table}[h!]
\centering
\begin{threeparttable}
\caption{Another table}
\begin{tabular}{@{} *{6}{c} @{}}
\toprule
ABS & \ 14,573.300\tnote{a} & 3 & 4,857.767 & 40.297 & .000 \\
\midrule
\end{tabular}

\footnotesize
\begin{tablenotes}
\item[a]\lipsum*[2] % the footnote itself
\end{tablenotes}

\end{threeparttable}
\end{table}

\end{document}

• thanks. Why \item[a]\lipsum[testing] the footnote keep repeat it 2 times, the outcome is testingtesting. How to make it to only appear testing? – aan Aug 8 at 17:29
• and it said missing numbers, treated as zero – aan Aug 8 at 17:31
• I found. \item[a] My Note.. Between what is \lipsum used for? I googled, cannot understand fully – aan Aug 8 at 17:40
• @aan - The command \lipsum is there to generate gibberish filler text. Its argument is optional and must be either a single integer or a range of integers, say, \lipsum[2] (see above) or \lipsum[1-20]. The former command prints out a single paragraph of filler text, whereas the latter outputs 20 [!] consecutive paragraphs of filler text. You can read more about the lipsum package online. \lipsum[testing] is a syntax error. To print out just the word "testing" after the footnote marker, write \item[a]testing. – Mico Aug 8 at 19:15