translation

capital letters

coluanai — Wed, 30 Nov 2011 15:18:06 +0000

Use minimal capitalisation. A heading starts with a capital, but other words should not be capped up, unless they are proper nouns. If in doubt, choose lower case.

Exceptions include: our Sun, Earth (the planet), and our Solar System, Universe and Moon, but not other suns, solar systems, universes and moons, or earth as in soil.

Use a capital letter when you are writing the names of people, languages, places and words relating to them:

dates

coluanai — Wed, 30 Nov 2011 15:23:18 +0000

Dates should be written Saturday, 24 April 2010 (not 24^th).

Use the following construction for spans of time:

Willibald Karl Jentschke was the Council delegate for the Federal Republic of Germany from 1964 to 1967.

Though this often reads better if reworded:

From 1964 to 1967, Willibald Karl Jentschke was the Council delegate for the Federal Republic of Germany.

italics

coluanai — Wed, 30 Nov 2011 15:27:54 +0000

Use italics for foreign phrases, unless they are commonly used in English.

An exception is eigenstates, which, although a German word, should be written in roman.

collective nouns

coluanai — Wed, 30 Nov 2011 16:17:54 +0000

Do they take a singular or plural verb? It depends on the sense, but use singular where possible.

e-mail

coluanai — Wed, 30 Nov 2011 16:26:54 +0000

use hyphen

internet

coluanai — Wed, 30 Nov 2011 16:29:06 +0000

Lower case, likewise "the net"

Higgs boson

coluanai — Wed, 30 Nov 2011 17:13:01 +0000

Upper-case "H", lower-case "b".

Avoid the tautology "Higgs-boson particle". A boson is a particle; there is no need to repeat yourself.

Named after the English physicist Peter Higgs, the Higgs boson is a subatomic particle whose existence is predicted by the theory that unified the weak and electromagnetic interactions.

gender neutrality

coluanai — Thu, 01 Dec 2011 10:12:27 +0000

CERN believes in equality, and it is important that we reflect this by using non-discriminatory language. Here are some tips for gender-neutral writing:

X-ray

coluanai — Thu, 01 Dec 2011 10:44:02 +0000

capital X, hyphen

Standard Model

coluanai — Thu, 01 Dec 2011 11:06:59 +0000

Caps when referring to the theory of particle physics.

The Standard Model is a theory that describes particle physics. The MacBook is a standard model of computer.

Add a hyphen when using the term as a compound adjective:

The results of the experiment were consistent with Standard-Model predictions.

Avoid abbreviating Standard Model to SM. It’s irritating to the reader to have to check back on unnecessary abbreviations.

mid-

coluanai — Thu, 01 Dec 2011 13:15:37 +0000

mid-50s

mid-1990s

mid-afternoon

mid-week

mid-season

But midday and midnight

Nobel prize

coluanai — Thu, 01 Dec 2011 14:15:04 +0000

Capitals for specific titles: Nobel Prize in Physics, Nobel Prize in Literature, Nobel Peace Prize, etc.

But: "She won a Nobel prize".

Nobel laureate

See nobelprize.org for detailed information about Nobel laureates, including biographies and full transcriptions of their acceptance speeches.

organisation, organise

coluanai — Thu, 01 Dec 2011 15:27:20 +0000

With an "s".

Except when referring to CERN – "The Organization" – which takes a "z" and an upper case "O". (This is because the name was spelled with a "z" in the CERN convention, so the "z" is part of the official name).

Remember, follow British English for spelling.

per cent, percentage

coluanai — Fri, 02 Dec 2011 13:58:51 +0000

Write per cent, not "percent". If using the % sign, don't put a space between it and the digit:

Of the 5000 people who answered the survey, 10% (or 10 per cent) were French.

58%, 90%, etc.

When calculating percentages, beware the "rose by/fell by X%" construction: an increase from 3% to 5% is a 2-percentage-point increase or a 2-point increase, not a 2% increase

Never use the "per thousand" symbol, ‰

LHC

coluanai — Fri, 03 Feb 2012 15:38:14 +0000

Large Hadron Collider

Initial capital letters. Always spell out first time (except in the CERN Courier), with abbreviation in brackets. Use the abbreviation thereafter.

Experiments at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) suggest...

Beware of tautologies: Don't use "The LHC machine" or "The LHC accelerator", as this is equivalent to saying "The Large Hadron Collider accelerator...", which doesn't mean anything (the LHC doesn't accelerate accelerators).