# How can I put a unary minus sign after a column separator?

I am using the aligned environment in order to have a sequence of left-aligned equations.

In this latex code:

\begin{aligned} & a = b \\ & -c = d \end{aligned}


There is some space between the minus sign and the "c" even though I want it to be a unary minus.

How can I make this minus sign that comes after an & be a unary minus?

Ideally I would like to have a way to do this that works with KaTeX, since that is what I'm using to render math (although this issue appears to happen with pdflatex too.)

• I often help myself with pictures for my inadequacy in English language. In my case, an image could help me solve your problem. – Sebastiano Oct 12 '19 at 19:24
• &{-c} should do what you want. – GuM Oct 12 '19 at 19:42

Simply encase the - symbol in curly braces. Doing so changes the symbol's math status from bin to ord (ordinary).

\begin{aligned} & a = b \\ & {-}c = d \end{aligned}


A full MWE:

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage{amsmath}
\begin{document}
\begin{aligned} & a = b \\ & -c = d\\ & {-}c = d \end{aligned}
\end{document}

• I have not understood the question :-( my congratulations. – Sebastiano Oct 12 '19 at 19:48