Creating attributes

I am trying to create an attribute with existing variables containing hyphens.

ex: a-1

However, when I try to use the AttributeConstructor in conjunction with this variable name, it misinterprets this as the variable a (nonexistent) subtracted by 1.

I have worked around this by using the Attribute renaming facility, however this is proving cumbersome as 120 of my 154 variables contain hyphens.

Is there an easier way to encapsulate a variable name containing ambiguous characters such as the hyphen?

Thanks,

- Pat