Columbia University Archives

How we experience pain may unlock the mystery of consciousness

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Professor Ambron examines the neurological systems involved in pain.

In a recent publication, Professor Richard Ambron of Columbia University in New York, USA, addresses the fascinating topic of consciousness. He reasons that if we can understand the consciousness of pain, we might better understand consciousness in general. He outlines the neurological systems involved in pain and theorises that the consciousness of pain arises through non-physical ‘waves’ known as local […]

ENACTS: Risk, Resilience, and the Revitalisation of Climate Services in the Developing World

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The availability of climate data is vital for the provision of effective climate services.

To build resilience and national capacity to manage climate variability and adapt to change, governments and other bodies need robust and decision-relevant climate information at different levels. In many places, however, including most African countries, collection of climate data has been seriously inadequate, and even when available, poorly accessible. The Enhancing National Climate Services (ENACTS) initiative, led by Dr Tufa […]

Black hole binaries and gravitational waves: Unlocking the secrets of our universe in unexpected ways

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When Albert Einstein predicted the existence of gravitational waves over one hundred years ago, nobody could foresee what the implications could possibly be – but, as they make the move from predicted theory to proven fact, researchers like Professor Zoltan Haiman, of Columbia University, are devising ways of using them to study binary systems of colliding black holes and the […]

A needle in a haystack – the future of big data

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A research article about how to structure large sums of data effectively

Dr Yang Feng is Associate Professor of Statistics at Columbia University. His research aims to structure, into a useful form, the voluminous data available from many areas of science, humanity, industry and governments, like social networks, the study of the genome, understanding economics or finance and health sciences. Using network modelling, he has focused on novel ways of detecting “communities” more […]