Basic LaTeX manual – Open Readings 2024

What is LaTeX?

LaTeX is a document preparation system used for writing and publication of scientific documents. One of the key advantages of LaTeX is its ability to produce high-quality documents with consistent formatting. In this simple tutorial we will learn some basic functions that will help us write the presentation abstract.

Superscript and subscript

Superscript

Let's say we are writing our paragraph and want to include a superscript, the most simple way would be like this:

$f(x) = a^{x-1} + b^3$

This LaTeX code produces: f(x) = a^x-1 + b³

Superscript, Non-Italic

If we don't want our function to be in italic font we can write like this:

f(x) = a$^{x-1}$ + b$^3$

This LaTeX code produces: f(x) = a^x-1 + b³

Subscript

Subscript works very much the same way except that we will use "_" instead of "^". It is also very simple to include both of these operations in the same expression. Here is an example:

$_2^4$He

This LaTeX code produces: ⁴₂He

Bold, italic and Greek letters

Bold

To write text in bold we can use the \textbf{} command. Here is an example:

\textbf{This is bold text}

This LaTeX code produces: This is bold text

Italic

For italic text we can use the \textit{} command. Here is an example:

\textit{This is italic text}

This LaTeX code produces: This is italic text

Greek Letters

Greek letters can be inserted by simply writing a backslash followed by the name of the letter like this:

\alpha, \beta, \gamma, \delta, \epsilon

This LaTeX code produces: α, β, γ, δ, ε

Writing formulas

Simple Formula

When writing an abstract it is common to include some formulas. Here is an example of how we can do that in LaTeX that will also enumerate formulas automatically:

Here is a formula we used to calculate the energy of a photon:

\begin{equation}

E=hf

\end{equation}

This LaTeX code produces:

Here is a formula we used to calculate the energy of a photon:

E = hf

(1)

Integral

More complex formulas often include integrals. They can be definite with lower limit and upper limit or indefinite. LaTeX notation for these two cases differs like this:

This is the format for definite integral where "a" and "b" are lower and upper limits respectively:

\begin{equation}

\int_a^b f(x) dx

\end{equation}

And this is how to format an indefinite integral, we simply exclude the "_a^b" part:

\begin{equation}

\int f(x) dx

\end{equation}

This LaTeX code produces:

This is the format for definite integral where "a" and "b" are lower and upper limits respectively:

∫^b_af(x) dx

(2)

And this is how to format an indefinite integral, we simply exclude the "_a^b" part":

∫ f(x) dx

(3)

Formating images

Images can be included using the \includegraphics{} command. Here is how:

\begin{figure}[H]

\center

\includegraphics[height=6cm]{image.jpg}

\caption{This is the figure caption}

\end{figure}

Here "image.jpg" is our image file. We can make it bigger or smaller by changing [height=6cm] section. The part "\caption{This is the figure caption}" will put a caption at the bottom of the figure and automatically numerate it.

By Džiugas Krencius