#84 plural in "equations"

[Nicolas Le Novère]

Several terms end up in "equations model". E.g.

ordinary differential equations model
partial differential equations model

Others in "equation model", e.g.

differential equation model

Which one should it be? Native English speakers?

[Anna Zhukova]

260 articles found on pubmed for "differential equation model" vs 34 for "differential equations model", so it looks like we should use the singular spelling.

We could still keep the other spelling as a synonym.

[Dagmar Waltemath]

Ok, I asked a native speaker.
Whether you say "equation" or "equations" seems to depend on whether you speak about one equation or a system of equations.
maybe we could consider both as systems of equations, one system only having one equation (probably unlikely anyhow).
So, I would vote for the plural.

However, I got the advice that we may consider using "model based on * differential equations", as this seems to be the term that a native would use to speak about that type of model. I like the term and would therefore propose to change the terms that relate to differential equations.

[David Nickerson]

However, I got the advice that we may consider using "model based on * differential equations", as this seems to be the term that a native would use to speak about that type of model. I like the term and would therefore propose to change the terms that relate to differential equations.

+1

[Nicolas Le Novère]

Just realised that my reply to the ticket was never posted. hmm.

I did a few Google and Google Scholar searches (I used model and models to get a more representative image):

"model based on differential equations"
G: 268 000
GS: 359

"models based on differential equations"
G: 106 000
GS: 880

"model using differential equations"
249 000
173

"models using differential equations"
1 850 000
880

"ordinary differential equation model"
232 000
1610

"ordinary differential equation models"
185 000
1020

"ordinary differential equations model"
126 000
388

Maybe using the DE was not a good test. So I did the search with the DDE.

"delay differential equation model"
86 100
957

"delay differential equations model"
22,400
200

"delay differential equation models"
46 300
599

"model based on delay differential equations"
9 320
19

"models based on delay differential equations"
44 600
15

"model using delay differential equations"
51 100
15

"models using delay differential equations"
3 220
17

So it seems that in the Scholar world, the form "XXX equation model" wins, without the plural at equation

[Anna Zhukova]

I would suggest to change all the terms in MAMO to "... equation model" form and add all the other name variants ("model based on ...", "model using ...", "... equations model") as alternative labels.
According to OBO foundry naming conventions "2.3 Prefer singular nominal form", we should prefer "model ..." form to "models ...".

[Nicolas Le Novère]

Agreed

[Anna Zhukova]

Fixed in rev. 48.