45

Do any one know how to type a very big parenthesis in LaTeX. Since the formula is very big, I used multline environment, in one line, there are many pair of parenthesis by using \left and \right which make them already very big. Between lines, I need some parenthesis bigger than the one given by \Bigg. My intention is to show the following big formula in multline environment:

$$
\frac{
      e^{-\frac{t \lambda +4}{4 \lambda \nu }}
      \left(
            e^{\frac{t}{4 \nu }}
            \left(
                  4 \sqrt{\pi } \sqrt{\nu }+1
            \right)
            \nu \Phi
            \left(
                  \frac{t-\frac{2}{\lambda }}{\sqrt{2} \sqrt{t \nu }}
            \right)
            \lambda^3
            -e^{\frac{t \lambda +8}{4 \lambda \nu }}
            \left(
                  4 \sqrt{\pi } \sqrt{\nu }-1
            \right)
            \nu
            \left(
                  \Phi
                  \left(
                        \frac{t+\frac{2}{\lambda }}{\sqrt{2} \sqrt{t \nu }}
                  \right)
                  -1
            \right)
            \lambda^3
            +e^{\frac{1}{\lambda \nu }}
            \left(
                  4 \sqrt{\pi } \lambda^3 \nu^{3/2}
                  \left(
                        2 \Phi
                        \left(
                              \frac{1}{\sqrt{2} \lambda \sqrt{t \nu }}
                        \right)
                        -1
                  \right)
                  -e^{\frac{t}{4 \nu }}
                  \left(
                        \left(
                              \lambda
                              \left(
                                    4 \sqrt{\pi } \sqrt{\nu }-1
                              \right)
                              \nu +2
                        \right)
                        \lambda^2+2
                        (\lambda \nu -2)
                        \Phi
                        \left(
                              \frac{\sqrt{\frac{t}{\nu }}}{\sqrt{2}}
                        \right)
                        \lambda^2-2
                   \right)
             \right)
       \right)
     }{4 \lambda }
$$
5
  • (tried to clean up the code a little for you) Commented Dec 9, 2010 at 10:05
  • 3
    Note that $$ ... $$ should not be used for displayed math, cf. l2tabu: ctan.org/pkg/l2tabu Commented Dec 9, 2010 at 10:44
  • @Torbjorn, shall we use "\[ \]" instead? Thanks. :-)
    – Anand
    Commented Dec 9, 2010 at 13:18
  • @anand: Yes, that or the equation* environment. Sorry, should have mentioned this in my previous comment. See also here and here. Commented Dec 9, 2010 at 16:22
  • Related Question:Big Parenthesis in an Equation. Commented Feb 23, 2013 at 5:28

2 Answers 2

53

The ams parenthesis of specific size are typeset by using \left and \right and putting in an invisible "thing" of a certain height to ensure that they are big enough. Mimicking that, you could do: \left(\rule{0cm}{2cm}\right. to get a left parenthesis of 2cm height. Note that the AMS command also adds a little horizontal space which you might need to put in as well. If you do this often, you could easily define new sizes:

\makeatletter
\newcommand{\vast}{\bBigg@{4}}
\newcommand{\Vast}{\bBigg@{5}}
\makeatother

Then in your document:

\[
\Vast( \frac{\prod_0^\infty k}{\sum_0^\infty n} \Vast)
\]

produces:

big parentheses

I recommend also taking a look at Vertically asymmetric size variation for parentheses about vertically centring parentheses.

(Note I've assumed that you're using amsmath since you tag it with amsmath and the commands \big and so forth are ones that amsmath produces. If you're using a different package to get these commands, then this solution won't work.)

4
  • Thank you Andrew. It is very useful. It solves my problem. :-)
    – Anand
    Commented Dec 9, 2010 at 10:30
  • very useful thanks a lot you are an angel !!
    – user11861
    Commented Feb 18, 2012 at 4:30
  • 5
    Great, but your code should also define \vastl, \vastm, and \vastr commands that work along the lines of \bigl, \bigm, and \bigr, right? Also \Vastl, \Vastm, and \Vastr?
    – MSC
    Commented Dec 7, 2013 at 0:49
  • \left(\rule{0cm}{2cm}\right. Worked for me! IN my case I used the curly bracket instead of the parenthesis. I even taylored the hight parameter, by trial and error, of the \rule to size the bracket just right. In my case I used em instead of cm so that it SHOULD self re-size if the font is ever changed. vis. \left.\rule{0em}{2.5em}\right\}
    – TommyK
    Commented Apr 23, 2015 at 19:06
3

I had the same requirement as Anand and came across this page. The solution recommended by Loop Space works flawlessly. However, when the equations are already too complex, typing \left(\rule{0cm}{2cm}\right. inside the math environment adds to the clutter. Therefore, I declared the following commands in my preamble and call them with the required height where it is necessary.

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage[cmex10]{amsmath}

\newcommand{\prb}[1]{\mathop{\mathrm{Pr}}\nolimits \left\{ {#1} \right\} }

\newcommand{\cstpl}[1]{\left(\rule{0 cm}{#1}\right.}
\newcommand{\cstpr}[1]{\left.\rule{0 cm}{#1}\right)}

\begin{document}

\begin{align*}
& Q = \cstpl{0.8cm} \prb{\frac{A^2_i}{B+C^3_i} \ge D } - \\
& \prb{\frac{E^2_j}{F^2_k+G} \ge H } \frac{ L }{ M } \cstpr{0.8cm}.
\end{align*}

\end{document}
1
  • 1
    Welcome to TeX.SX! The cmex10 option to amsmath is for compatibility with very old TeX distributions and should not be used with newer (later than 1998 or so) ones.
    – egreg
    Commented Oct 7, 2017 at 20:34

You must log in to answer this question.

Not the answer you're looking for? Browse other questions tagged .