State of the Planet

News from the Columbia Climate School

Year: 20124

  • Glenn Denning’s Road to Bali, and the Earth Institute

    Glenn Denning’s Road to Bali, and the Earth Institute

    Glenn Denning grew up in Brisbane, Australia, loved the outdoors and hated the idea of working in an office. And, he really didn’t have any urge to go to other countries. Then he happened to overhear a conversation in a hallway between two students. That bit of serendipity sent him on a road to a…

  • Predicting the Future of Soy in South America

    Predicting the Future of Soy in South America

    In this Q&A, Arthur M. Greene discusses improving climate and agricultural modeling in South America using a new stochastic simulation of future climate.

  • Panel on New York’s Future After Sandy

    Panel on New York’s Future After Sandy

    In a live webcast this afternoon from Hunter College, Earth Institute scientists Cynthia Rosenzweig and Klaus Jacob will join a panel on “Hurricane Sandy and Challenges to the NY Metropolitan Region.”

  • Visualizing Malaria from Space

    Visualizing Malaria from Space

    Public health professionals are increasingly concerned about the impact climate variability and change can have on infectious diseases such as malaria, dengue fever and bacterial meningitis. However, in order to study the relationships between climate and …

  • If You’re Not Going to San Francisco

    If You’re Not Going to San Francisco

    Keep an eye on State of the Planet over the next week for updates on the fall meeting of the American Geophysical Union.

  • Frozen Water on Mercury, NASA Confirms

    Frozen Water on Mercury, NASA Confirms

    Mercury, the planet closest to the Sun, may hold at least 100 billion tons of ice in permanently shaded craters near its north pole, NASA scientists announced Thursday. The findings come as NASA’s MESSENGER spacecraft nears its second year of orbit around Mercury. MESSENGER’s lead investigator, Sean Solomon, is director of Columbia University’s Lamont-Doherty Earth…

  • This Week’s Forecast: Sunny with a 40 Percent Chance of Flu

    This Week’s Forecast: Sunny with a 40 Percent Chance of Flu

    New computer model takes a page from weather forecasting to predict regional peaks in influenza outbreaks.

  • What Hurricane Sandy Was Not

    What Hurricane Sandy Was Not

    “It is often said that generals always prepare to fight the last war. We need to be sure that we do not just prepare for the last disaster, and put all of our limited resources in guarding against that one, without thinking about the other things that could happen.”

  • Tree Rings to Investigate Chimborazo’s Past Climate

    Tree Rings to Investigate Chimborazo’s Past Climate

    The landscape around Chimborazo resembles the high desert in parts of the western United States. The terrain approaching Chimborazo is arid and rocky in appearance, with mostly small grassy and shrub-like vegetation growing on it. Finding trees large enough to sample above 4000 meters was, needless to say, a bit of a challenge, but they…

  • Glenn Denning’s Road to Bali, and the Earth Institute

    Glenn Denning’s Road to Bali, and the Earth Institute

    Glenn Denning grew up in Brisbane, Australia, loved the outdoors and hated the idea of working in an office. And, he really didn’t have any urge to go to other countries. Then he happened to overhear a conversation in a hallway between two students. That bit of serendipity sent him on a road to a…

  • Predicting the Future of Soy in South America

    Predicting the Future of Soy in South America

    In this Q&A, Arthur M. Greene discusses improving climate and agricultural modeling in South America using a new stochastic simulation of future climate.

  • Panel on New York’s Future After Sandy

    Panel on New York’s Future After Sandy

    In a live webcast this afternoon from Hunter College, Earth Institute scientists Cynthia Rosenzweig and Klaus Jacob will join a panel on “Hurricane Sandy and Challenges to the NY Metropolitan Region.”

  • Visualizing Malaria from Space

    Visualizing Malaria from Space

    Public health professionals are increasingly concerned about the impact climate variability and change can have on infectious diseases such as malaria, dengue fever and bacterial meningitis. However, in order to study the relationships between climate and …

  • If You’re Not Going to San Francisco

    If You’re Not Going to San Francisco

    Keep an eye on State of the Planet over the next week for updates on the fall meeting of the American Geophysical Union.

  • Frozen Water on Mercury, NASA Confirms

    Frozen Water on Mercury, NASA Confirms

    Mercury, the planet closest to the Sun, may hold at least 100 billion tons of ice in permanently shaded craters near its north pole, NASA scientists announced Thursday. The findings come as NASA’s MESSENGER spacecraft nears its second year of orbit around Mercury. MESSENGER’s lead investigator, Sean Solomon, is director of Columbia University’s Lamont-Doherty Earth…

  • This Week’s Forecast: Sunny with a 40 Percent Chance of Flu

    This Week’s Forecast: Sunny with a 40 Percent Chance of Flu

    New computer model takes a page from weather forecasting to predict regional peaks in influenza outbreaks.

  • What Hurricane Sandy Was Not

    What Hurricane Sandy Was Not

    “It is often said that generals always prepare to fight the last war. We need to be sure that we do not just prepare for the last disaster, and put all of our limited resources in guarding against that one, without thinking about the other things that could happen.”

  • Tree Rings to Investigate Chimborazo’s Past Climate

    Tree Rings to Investigate Chimborazo’s Past Climate

    The landscape around Chimborazo resembles the high desert in parts of the western United States. The terrain approaching Chimborazo is arid and rocky in appearance, with mostly small grassy and shrub-like vegetation growing on it. Finding trees large enough to sample above 4000 meters was, needless to say, a bit of a challenge, but they…