How to add bar above a letter in xlabel

I want to add a bar above the letter U (i.e. a horizontal line above the letter). Why will Matlab not accept xlabel('\bar{U}','Interpreter','Latex')? The output is Warning: Error updating Text.

 Character vector must have valid interpreter syntax:
\bar{U}

Is it because there is no bar command in Matlab?

Answer 1

[Walter Roberson]

xlabel('$\bar{U}$','Interpreter','Latex')

[cvbnm]

Perfect, thank you!

[beginner94]

How can a bar be put over letters used as variables? (I'm using R2007b)

Thank you

[Walter Roberson]

If you are talking about xlabel / ylabel or title, or about text(), you can use the \bar I showed above.

If you are talking about in code, like assigning to a variable named U̅ then that is not possible in MATLAB.

[Steven Lord]

If you have the letter over which you want to place the bar stored in a variable:

x = 'U';
s1 = sprintf('$\\bar{%c}$', x)
xlabel(s1, 'Interpreter', 'LaTeX');

Or to avoid having to escape the backslash:

s2 = ['$\bar{' x '}$']
xlabel(s2, 'Interpreter', 'LaTeX');

You don't technically have to define the variables s1 and s2, you could put the commands that define those variables into the xlabel command itself. I separated those commands from the xlabel call so you can see what those variables contain.

[Oscar Espinosa]

But if I have text before the bar, doesn't work. There is another method?

I tried this:

zlabel('Относительный силовой фактор $\bar{G}$','Interpreter','Latex')

[Walter Roberson]

you cannot use Unicode with Latex.

Unfortunately at this time I do not seem to be able to get \bar or \overline or \stackrel to work with Interpreter tex

Answer 2

[Léo]

Hi,

I have the same problem than Oscar. I want to put some text before and after putting the letter with the bar.

In my case, I have ylabel('Average concentration of species j (Cbar_j) [mol/m^3]'). If anyone has a clue for me I would be greatfull.

Thanks in advance.

[Walter Roberson]

ylabel('$Average\: concentration\: of\: species\: j\: (\bar{C}_j)\: [mol/{m^3}]$', 'interpreter', 'latex')

[Léo]

Thank you so much :)

Is it possible to take out the italic font and only have it between the parentheses ?

[Walter Roberson]

ylabel('$\mathrm{Average\: concentration\: of\: species\: j\: (}\bar{C}_j\mathrm{)\: [mol/{m^3}]}$', 'interpreter', 'latex')

[Léo]

Thank you so much.

I had no idea you could do so much playing with both matlab and latex

[Walter Roberson]

Unfortunately fonts in math mode are somewhat restricted in pure LateX, and MATLAB does not support the use of \usepackage that might permit much more extensive customization.