Use of English

a lot

Two words

Read more
grammar, spelling

a or an before H?

Use an before a silent H: an heir, an hour, an honest politician, an honorary consul; use a before an aspirated H: a hero, a hotel, a historian (but don't change a direct quote if the speaker says, for example, "an historic"). With abbreviations, be guided by pronunciation: an LSE student, a CERN student

Read more
grammar

a posteriori

use italics

Read more
style, translation

a priori

use italics

Read more
style, translation

AAAS

American Association for the Advancement of Science

Spell out in first use then use acronym for the CERN Courier

Read more
abbreviations, acronyms, Courier

abbreviations and acronyms

Do not use full stops in abbreviations, or spaces between initials, including those in proper names:

US, M&S, WE Weber, WH Smith, etc.

Use all capitals if an abbreviation is pronounced as the individual letters: BBC, VAT, etc; if it is an acronym (i.e. pronounced as a word) spell out with all capitals (NASA, NATO, etc.) unless it can be considered to have entered the language as an everyday word, such as awol, laser and, more recently, asbo and sim card.

Read more
abbreviations, acronyms, style

above-mentioned

use hyphen

Read more
style, translation

absolute zero

Not "the absolute zero".

-273.15 °C or 0 K.

The apparatus was cooled to near absolute zero to ensure that the electronics were in a superconducting state

Read more
grammar

AC

CERN Audit Committee (replaced SACA in 2017)

Read more
abbreviations, acronyms, translation

accelerators

Spell out the name at first mention, then abbreviate in brackets (but not all names need spelling out for the CERN Courier – see individual entries). Only use capital letters if it is the only machine with that name in the world.

This synchrocyclotron (SC) was built in 1957, whereas the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) was completed in 2009. The SC accelerates ions…

Read more
abbreviations, acronyms, Courier, style

accents

Include all accents in French, German, Portuguese, Spanish and Irish Gaelic words. But for words that have been assimilated into English (café, résumé) follow OED.

Note that capital letters in French also take an accent, so état membre becomes État membre

Read more
style

ACCU

Advisory Committee of CERN Users

Read more
abbreviations, acronyms, translation

ACE

Antiproton Cell Experiment

Read more
abbreviations, acronyms, translation

actor

for both sexes, never actress

See gender neutrality

Read more
style

AD

Antiproton Decelerator

Read more
abbreviations, acronyms, translation

ad hoc, ad hoc group

no italics, no hyphens

Read more
translation

ad interim

use italics

Read more
translation

addendum, addenda (pl.)

spelling, translation

administration

but Administration in French

Read more
translation

Administrative Circular

Initial capital letters, "No.", then a space followed by a digit, space, open bracket, "Rev.", space, digit, close brackets. See below: 

Administrative Circular No. 25 (Rev. 3)

Read more
style

adverbs

No hyphen is normally needed between an adverb and the adjective it modifies:

a hotly contested result

a constantly evolving theory

To avoid ambiguity, a hyphen is needed after adverbs such as “ill” and “well” that have the same spelling as the corresponding adjective, as in

a well-dressed man

an ill-considered reply

No hyphen is needed if the adverbial phrase comes after the noun, as in

the man was well dressed

Read more
grammar

advertise

spelling, translation

advise, adviser, advisable

not advisor

Read more
spelling, translation

AEGIS

Antihydrogen Experiment: gravity, Interferometry Spectroscopy

Note that the alternative spelling “AEgIS”, sometimes stylised with a bar over the g to indicate antimatter, is also used by the collaboration.

Read more
abbreviations, acronyms, translation

aesthetic

translation

aforementioned

translation

age, aged, ageing, ageism

Five years of age, but a five-year-old child

Aged five years or more

Read more
spelling, translation

aide-mémoire, aides-mémoire (pl.)

spelling, translation

air conditioning

but air-conditioning system and air-conditioned

Read more
translation

ALARA

As Low As Reasonably Achievable

Read more
abbreviations, acronyms, translation

ALICE

A Large Ion Collider Experiment
Acronym doesn’t need spelling out for the CERN Courier.

Read more
abbreviations, acronyms, Courier

allot, allotted, allotment

translation

ALPHA

Antihydrogen Laser Physics Apparatus

Read more
abbreviations, acronyms

ALPHA-2

Antihydrogen Laser Physics Apparatus-2 (preceded by ALPHA)

Read more
abbreviations, acronyms, translation

alumni (pl.)

alumnus (male singular), alumna (female singular), alumni (male OR mixed plural), alumnae (female plural)

Read more
spelling, translation

am and pm / a.m. and p.m.

Can be written without full stops in informal and web contexts, but should be written a.m. and p.m. in official documents, such as minutes.

See time and section 5.c) of the full Style Guide

Read more
style

AMANDA

Antarctic Muon And Neutrino Detector Array, a neutrino telescope located beneath the Amundsen–Scott South Pole Station

Acronym doesn’t need spelling out for the CERN Courier

Read more
abbreviations, acronyms, Courier

amour propre

use italics

Read more
translation

ampersand (&)

Don't use them, even in headlines. 

Exceptions:

  • specific abbrevations, such as R&D
  • the CERN & Society Foundation
  • certain company names – Smith & Jones Consulting
  • when artistic considerations dictate – on a logo, for example 
  • academic references – (Grant & Smith, 1998)
Read more
punctuation, style, translation

AMS

Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer

Not Alphamagnetic Spectrometer

Read more
abbreviations, acronyms, translation

analogue

but analog in a computing context

Read more
translation

analyse

Not "analyze"

Read more
spelling, style

Année mondiale de la physique

Spell out in full for the CERN Courier

Read more
Courier

ANTARES

Astronomy with a Neutrino Telescope and Abyss environmental RESearch

Acronym doesn’t need spelling out for the CERN Courier

Read more
Courier

antennae

of insects

Read more
translation

antennas

of radios

Read more
translation

anti-de Sitter space

Courier

anti-ion

spelling, style, translation

antiatom

Not anti-atom. Likewise antiparticle, antihydrogen, antineutrino, etc.

But: anti-ion.

See antimatter

Read more
spelling, style

antimatter

Not anti-matter. Likewise antiparticle, antihydrogen, antineutrino, etc.

But: anti-ion.

See particles

Read more
spelling, style

Pages

You are here