Export to pdf fails with \degree in notebook

[spdavern]

While trying to convert a minimum Jupyter notebook to pdf, jupyter nbconvert fails:

▶ jupyter nbconvert --to pdf failing.ipynb

Gives the following traceback:

...
lse\n* (1in=72.27pt=25.4mm, 1cm=28.453pt)\n\n\nPackage hyperref Warning: Rerun to get /PageLabels entry.\n\n(/usr/local/texlive/2024/texmf-dist/tex/latex/amsfonts/umsa.fd)\n(/usr/local/texlive/2024/texmf-dist/tex/latex/amsfonts/umsb.fd)\n(/usr/local/texlive/2024/texmf-dist/tex/latex/jknapltx/ursfs.fd)\n\nLaTeX Warning: No \\author given.\n\n\nLaTeX Font Warning: Font shape `U/rsfs/m/n' in size <5.475> not available\n(Font)              size <5> substituted on input line 395.\n\n! Undefined control sequence.\nl.395     \\(\\degree\n                   \\)\n? \n! Emergency stop.\nl.395 \n      \nNo pages of output.\nTranscript written on notebook.log.\n"
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "/Users/dave646/.conda/envs/cadet/bin/jupyter-nbconvert", line 10, in <module>
    sys.exit(main())
  File "/Users/me/.conda/envs/my_env/lib/python3.10/site-packages/jupyter_core/application.py", line 283, in launch_instance
    super().launch_instance(argv=argv, **kwargs)
  File "/Users/me/.conda/envs/my_env/lib/python3.10/site-packages/traitlets/config/application.py", line 1075, in launch_instance
    app.start()
  File "/Users/me/.conda/envs/my_env/lib/python3.10/site-packages/nbconvert/nbconvertapp.py", line 412, in start
    self.convert_notebooks()
  File "/Users/me/.conda/envs/my_env/lib/python3.10/site-packages/nbconvert/nbconvertapp.py", line 590, in convert_notebooks
    self.convert_single_notebook(notebook_filename)
  File "/Users/me/.conda/envs/my_env/lib/python3.10/site-packages/nbconvert/nbconvertapp.py", line 556, in convert_single_notebook
    output, resources = self.export_single_notebook(
  File "/Users/me/.conda/envs/my_env/lib/python3.10/site-packages/nbconvert/nbconvertapp.py", line 479, in export_single_notebook
    output, resources = self.exporter.from_filename(
  File "/Users/me/.conda/envs/my_env/lib/python3.10/site-packages/nbconvert/exporters/templateexporter.py", line 389, in from_filename
    return super().from_filename(filename, resources, **kw)  # type:ignore[return-value]
  File "/Users/me/.conda/envs/my_env/lib/python3.10/site-packages/nbconvert/exporters/exporter.py", line 203, in from_filename
    return self.from_file(f, resources=resources, **kw)
  File "/Users/me/.conda/envs/my_env/lib/python3.10/site-packages/nbconvert/exporters/templateexporter.py", line 395, in from_file
    return super().from_file(file_stream, resources, **kw)  # type:ignore[return-value]
  File "/Users/me/.conda/envs/my_env/lib/python3.10/site-packages/nbconvert/exporters/exporter.py", line 222, in from_file
    return self.from_notebook_node(
  File "/Users/me/.conda/envs/my_env/lib/python3.10/site-packages/nbconvert/exporters/pdf.py", line 200, in from_notebook_node
    self.run_latex(tex_file)
  File "/Users/me/.conda/envs/my_env/lib/python3.10/site-packages/nbconvert/exporters/pdf.py", line 169, in run_latex
    return self.run_command(
  File "/Users/me/.conda/envs/my_env/lib/python3.10/site-packages/nbconvert/exporters/pdf.py", line 159, in run_command
    raise raise_on_failure(msg)
nbconvert.exporters.pdf.LatexFailed: PDF creating failed, captured latex output:
Failed to run "['xelatex', 'notebook.tex', '-quiet']" command:
This is XeTeX, Version 3.141592653-2.6-0.999996 (TeX Live 2024) (preloaded format=xelatex)
 restricted \write18 enabled.
entering extended mode
(./notebook.tex
...

The following jupyter notebook failing.ipynb contains only the text \degree in a markdown cell. Literally, the 1st and only cell in the notebook is markdown and contains the word degree with a backslash preceding it.
failing.ipynb

{
 "cells": [
  {
   "cell_type": "markdown",
   "metadata": {},
   "source": [
    "\\degree"
   ]
  }
 ],
 "metadata": {
  "kernelspec": {
   "display_name": "my_env",
   "language": "python",
   "name": "python3"
  },
  "language_info": {
   "name": "python",
   "version": "3.10.16"
  }
 },
 "nbformat": 4,
 "nbformat_minor": 2
}

▶ jupyter --version
Selected Jupyter core packages...
IPython          : 8.20.0
ipykernel        : 6.28.0
ipywidgets       : 7.6.5
jupyter_client   : 8.6.0
jupyter_core     : 5.5.0
jupyter_server   : 2.10.0
jupyterlab       : 4.0.11
nbclient         : 0.8.0
nbconvert        : 7.10.0
nbformat         : 5.9.2
notebook         : 7.0.8
qtconsole        : 5.4.2
traitlets        : 5.7.1

What I expect is to get is the following which was obtained by removing the backslash before degree in the notebook cell:

▶ jupyter nbconvert --to pdf failing.ipynb
[NbConvertApp] Converting notebook failing.ipynb to pdf
[NbConvertApp] Writing 19514 bytes to notebook.tex
[NbConvertApp] Building PDF
[NbConvertApp] Running xelatex 3 times: ['xelatex', 'notebook.tex', '-quiet']
[NbConvertApp] Running bibtex 1 time: ['bibtex', 'notebook']
[NbConvertApp] WARNING | bibtex had problems, most likely because there were no citations
[NbConvertApp] PDF successfully created
[NbConvertApp] Writing 8363 bytes to failing.pdf

I originally encountered this issue because I was using $\degree$ in a different notebook to get a degree ($\degree$) symbol in my markdown. This SO issue caused me to investigate this avenue. However, I came to realize that the issue could be reproduced without the LaTeX.

\degree in a python cell, for example in a comment, does not reproduce the failure. For example this notebook is successfully exportable:

{
 "cells": [
  {
   "cell_type": "markdown",
   "metadata": {},
   "source": [
    "degree"
   ]
  },
  {
   "cell_type": "code",
   "execution_count": 1,
   "metadata": {},
   "outputs": [],
   "source": [
    "# \\degree"
   ]
  }
 ],
 "metadata": {
  "kernelspec": {
   "display_name": "my_env",
   "language": "python",
   "name": "python3"
  },
  "language_info": {
   "codemirror_mode": {
    "name": "ipython",
    "version": 3
   },
   "file_extension": ".py",
   "mimetype": "text/x-python",
   "name": "python",
   "nbconvert_exporter": "python",
   "pygments_lexer": "ipython3",
   "version": "3.10.16"
  }
 },
 "nbformat": 4,
 "nbformat_minor": 2
}