How to use acronym package to use greek letterswhile using unicode greek letters in regular text

Question

I haven't been able to look up an answer for this.

The idea is to use the acronym with the greek letter alpha or gamma for example, while using the regular unicode greek character in the text.

The issue with acronym is that putting the unicode character in the acronym will not make it appear in the acronym section but only in the text.

Currently my solution makes it appear as a math alpha in the text :

I'm using Quarto with pdf output, thus using latex :

---
title: "quarto-test-env"
format: pdf
header-includes:
- \usepackage{acronym}
- \usepackage{upgreek}
keep-tex: true
mainfont: "Times New Roman"
---

# Acronyms


\begin{acronym}
  \acro{ifng}[IFN-$\mupgamma$]{interferon gamma}
  \acro{tnfa}[TNF-$\mupalpha$]{tumor necrosis factor alpha}
  \acro{nfkb}[NF-κB]{nuclear factor-kappa B}
\end{acronym}

# Regular text

- \ac{tnfa}
- \ac{ifng}

I want TNF-α and not \ac{tnfa} ; IFN-γ and not \ac{ifng}.
When I use unicode characters in acronym such as \ac{nfkb}, it doesn't display in the acronym but in the regular text only.

I want to make it appear using unicode characters like : TNF-α ; IFN-γ

I'm using Times News Roman as the font.

Is there a solution for that or do I have to scrap the idea ?

Thanks for the help.

Answer 1

I can't reproduce your issue with characters appearing in text but not the list or vice versa (either from the supplied gist or minimal code) and can't imagine why this might happen. My guess would be there's either something you're not showing or Quarto/pandoc are responsible.

As far as getting upright Greek characters to work with acronym (at least when supplying the optional short form argument) goes, there's nothing special about the use of acronym, it's the same problem as with general text (see e.g. Upright Greek letters in text mode (not upgreek), Upright Lowercase $\pi$, How to easily use UTF-8 with LaTeX?, Upright Greek font fitting to Computer Modern)).

With pdflatex one example would be

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage[T1]{fontenc}
\usepackage{acronym}
\usepackage{upgreek}
\DeclareUnicodeCharacter{03B3}{$\upgamma$}

\begin{document}
\begin{acronym}
  \acro{ifng}[IFN-γ]{interféron gamma}
  \acro{tnfa}[TNF-$\upalpha$]{tumor necrosis factor alpha}
\end{acronym}

\ac{tnfa}
\ac{ifng}
\end{document}

IFN-γ interféron gamma

TNF-α tumor necrosis factor alpha

tumor necrosis factor alpha (TNF-α) interféron gamma (IFN-γ)

or with lualatex with a suitable font

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage{libertine}
\usepackage{acronym}

\begin{document}
\begin{acronym}
  \acro{ifng}[IFN-γ]{interféron gamma}
  \acro{tnfa}[TNF-α]{tumor necrosis factor alpha}
\end{acronym}

\ac{tnfa}
\ac{ifng}
\end{document}

IFN-γ interféron gamma

TNF-α tumor necrosis factor alpha

tumor necrosis factor alpha (TNF-α) interféron gamma (IFN-γ)

In all these cases, the alpha and gamma characters copy over as the U+03B1 and U+03B3 characters.