Chapter 3 Mathematical Notations
This is a table of mathematical notation used in university courses which may be unfamiliar to some students.
| \(\forall\) | For all |
| \(\exists\) | There exists |
| \(\implies\) | Implies |
| \(\therefore\) | Therefore |
| \(a \neq b\) | \(a\) is not equal to \(b\) |
| \(\emptyset\) | The empty set |
| \(\{a,b,c\}\) | An explicit set with these three elements |
| \(a \in A\) | \(a\) is an element of the set \(A\) |
| \(A \subset B\) | \(A\) is a subset of the set \(B\) |
| \(\{ a \in A \big| a \text{ is something }\}\) | All \(a \in A\) that satisfy a property |
| \(A \cup B\) | The union of the sets \(A\) and \(B\) |
| \(A \cap B\) | The intersection of the sets \(A\) and \(B\) |
| \(A \setminus B\) | The elements of the set \(A\) which are also not in the set \(B\) |
| \(\NN\) | The natural numbers: \(\{1,2,3, \ldots \}\) |
| \(\ZZ\) | The intergers: \(\{\ldots, -2,1,0,-1,2, \ldots \}\) |
| \(\QQ\) | The rational numbers |
| \(\RR\) | The real numbers |
| \(\CC\) | The complex numbers |
| \(f: A \rightarrow B\) | A function from \(A\) to \(B\) |
| \(f(x) \Big|_{x=a}\) | The evaluation of a function at a point |
| \(f \circ g\) | The composition of the functions \(f\) and \(g\) |
| \((a,b)\) | The open interval \(a \lt x \lt b \subset \RR\) |
| \([a,b]\) | The closed interval \(a \leq x \leq b \subset \RR\) |
| \((a,b]\) | The half-open interval \(a \lt x \leq b \subset \RR\) |
| \([a,b)\) | The half-open interval \(a \leq x \lt b \subset \RR\) |
