\documentclass[12pt]{article} \usepackage{amssymb,amsmath,amscd,concmath} \pagestyle{empty} \begin{document} \begin{equation*}\cal{U}_i^\dagger \cal{U}_{i+1}\approx {\leavevmode\hbox{\small1\kern-3.8pt\normalsize1}} +\vec{A}_i \cdot \Delta \vec{\lambda}_i\end{equation*} \end{document}