Who put the “x” in LPPX

Posted by Rezwan on Jan 13, 2011 at 04:00 PM
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The “x” in LPPX stands for “experiment.”  LPP is “Lawrenceville Plasma Physics” and they are conducting an experiment.  LPPX is not a company, it’s a company’s experiment. 

The use of “x” for “experiment” is common in many fusion endeavors.  LDX, NSTX, and…more.

It turns out the x helps make these names memorable.  It’s a good marketing strategy.

Per the BMJ, in “A dose by any other name”, drug companies are recklessly leveraging the appeal of the letters “x” and “z”:

If you leaf through the June 2000 issue of the British Journal of Cardiology you will see advertisements for Zocor, Xenical, and Cozaar before you reach a brand name that does not contain a prominent x or z (and that brand is Viagra). In an issue of Hospital Doctor from the same month (22 June), adverts for Celebrex, Topamax, Flomax, Vioxx, Zispin, Zyprexa, Oxis, Efexor, and Fosamax outnumber those for brands not containing letters from the tail end of the alphabet. Examination of the British National Formulary (BNF) from 1986 to 2004 confirms that z and x suddenly achieved remarkable and previously unexplained popularity in the branding of drugs.

Many reasons are given for the steep rise in z’s and x’s. 

One suggestion for the popularity of z is that it works well in the Middle East, which was becoming an increasingly important market for drug companies. This has a superficial plausibility: think of how Arab scientists launched astronomy with the terms zenith and azimuth and zodiac. X, though representing the unknown for centuries, has been famously associated with medical advance since x rays. So this too would have appeal.

More likely, though, is that use of these letters relates to the imperative to make a brand name highly visible in a crowd. Reflecting their infrequent occurrence in English words, x and z count for 8 and 10 points in Scrabble, the highest values (along with j and q) in the game. So names that contain them are likely to seem special and be memorable. “If you meet them in running text, they stand out,” is the way one industry insider explained. Generally, they are also easy to pronounce.

Z has greater “zuxess”, of course, with x trailing its lead:

The widespread use of x at the start of a brand is a more recent ploy in drug marketing, seemingly designed to achieve the sound of a z while looking different. In the 1985 BNF there are a few (notably Xanax, Xylocard, and Xyloproct). The big year for brand introductions with this feature did not come until 2002, but by 2005 there were more than a dozen including Xalacom, Xenazine, Xyzal (successor to Zirtek), Xeloda, and Xatral.

Pharmaceuticals, in an effort to compete with placebos, need to pad their products with value:*

People who work in branding speak of it as a means of making a product more than it actually is. In many areas, this is achieved by adding persuasive emotional (and some would say irrational) content. If you buy a car named after an animal famed for its exhilarating speed and elegance, that is what you associate with the vehicle. But in the tightly regulated world of pharmaceuticals, drug names are supposed to be devoid of what the Medicines Control Agency used to call “unsubstantiable beneficial” connotations.

Fusion experiments, in contrast, are using x in the traditional way:  to represent the unknown.  If researchers get additional marketing benefits from it, that’s just dandy.  Ultimately, it would be nice to go from x: unknown to y: yes, it works! or v: validated. 

*Just kidding.  Any chance to trash talk pharmaceutical companies.  Perhaps out of jealousy, since the health care industry gets $30 billion in one year which is more than fusion research has had for the past 57 years.  And there is no energy placebo.  Fusion requires actual results.  Ouch!