How to put a subscript in a superscript

Question

How can I write the following thing?

a^(b_c), b being a superscript of a, and c being a subscript of b.

try a^{b_c}, note { }, not ( )... Welcome to the group! — cmhughes, May 21 '13 at 20:13
Welcome to TeX.SX! You may have a look on our starter guide. — Henri Menke, May 21 '13 at 20:13
If you have more questions like this, consider reading one of the books listed here: What is the best book to start learning LaTeX? — Henri Menke, May 21 '13 at 20:17
@cmhughes Why should this be too localized? Easy (from the point of view of an experienced user) ≠ too localized. This may very well end up a very popular question. — doncherry, May 21 '13 at 21:13
@doncherry if you feel that it is a good question, feel free to up vote it and post an answer — cmhughes, May 21 '13 at 21:33
@cmhughes I had forgotten to upvote, but did now, even though it’s questionable because of the “shows research effort” requirement. I’m not really inclined to post an answer because I don’t use math mode at all; I think it’d be better if one of the many people who know their way around these areas posted an answer. — doncherry, May 21 '13 at 22:00
In general, I would say that having sub-/superscripts within sub-/superscripts is quite bad practice. You might consider refactoring your text to avoid this. — John Wickerson, May 22 '13 at 09:44

score 5 · Accepted Answer · edited Apr 13 '17 at 12:35

5

You can use

a^{b_c}

note that I have used {} instead of ().

Your question is perfectly reasonable- for further reading, you might like to look at What are good learning resources for a LaTeX beginner?

edited Apr 13 '17 at 12:35

Community

1

answered Aug 11 '13 at 19:33

cmhughes

100,947

score 0 · Answer 2 · edited Jan 26 '17 at 13:00

0

a^{\left(b_c\right)}

Note that the curly brackets {} are used in latex to set delimiters on the preceding operator (in this case ^). The variable size brackets enclose the text, although it's not clear from what you wrote if you want these in the final setting. An alternative is a^{b_c} or a^{b_{c}}, although the curly braces are implicit and not needed for a single expression. If you wanted, you could write: a^{b_{c^{d_e}}}, which would look weird, but be valid.

edited Jan 26 '17 at 13:00

Martin Schröder

15,156

answered Jan 26 '17 at 12:51

hortens

1

1

There is no reason to use \left ... \right here. Other than that, good explanation. – daleif Jan 26 '17 at 13:14

How to put a subscript in a superscript

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