We find that algebraic sums of decay rates are fairly common, which make a notation such as \gamma_{\widetilde{ij}}=i \gamma_a + j\gamma_\sigma useful (e.g., \gamma_{\widetilde{31}}=3\gamma_a+\gamma_\sigma). This is, however, a bit of a pain to typeset:
(e.g., $\gamma_{\widetilde{31}}=3\gamma_a+\gamma_\sigma$)
In emacs, this regexp substitution allows to transliterate \gamma_{31} into the widetilde form:
Replace regexp (default _{\([0-9][0-9]\)} -> _{\\widetilde{\1}}):