horizontal curly braces

Question

Possible Duplicate:
Using braces to label parts of an equation

How do I put horizontal curly braces beneath and over parts of a formula? I tried to use \stackrel and \mathtop, but it did not work.

Answer 1

You can try the following commands:

\overbrace{your-formula}^\text{your comment} 
\underbrace{your-formula}_\text{your comment} 

An example that I took from Wikibooks:

\[
  z = \overbrace{
    \underbrace{x}_\text{real} +
    \underbrace{iy}_\text{imaginary}
   }^\text{complex number}
 \]

Their result:

Don't forget to add

\usepackage{amsmath} 

at the beginning of your document