Big Data

World News

A Remote Chinese Province Uses Its Climate To Grow A Big-Data Industry

11:19pm July 03, 2017

by Anthony Kuhn

Southwest China's Guizhou province is one of the country's poorest, most remote regions. But Guizhou has some unique advantages, which it is trying to use to transform itself into a big-data hub.

Queue Listen Now

Making different decisions about where you buy groceries could affect economic disparity, new research shows.

Economy

Could You Help Rewire Income Disparity?

3:09pm June 27, 2017

by Adam Frank

New research using network science shows that shifting individual behavior in small ways could influence economic equality, says blogger Adam Frank.

This computer-enhanced barium contrast X-ray shows colon cancer in red. Researchers have been trying to figure out what looks to be a decade-long rise in colon cancer among people younger than 50.

Why Are More Young Americans Getting Colon Cancer?

12:53pm February 28, 2017

by Richard Harris

Data suggests that the rate of colon cancer among people under 50 is on the rise, but there are lots of possible explanations for that. Scientists say teasing out the truth will be tricky.

Biomedical researchers are amassing huge amounts of patient data but are having trouble making sense of the information.

Big Data Coming In Faster Than Biomedical Researchers Can Process It

6:28pm November 28, 2016

by Richard Harris

There's a plethora of projects to gather data about the brain, various kinds of cancer and every type of cell in the body. But researchers are struggling to keep up with the information explosion.

Queue Listen Now

See How Global Health Has Changed Since You Were Born

4:21pm November 02, 2016

by Malaka Gharib

Global Health Check lets you enter your birth year for a look at disease milestones, life spans, mortality rates and more.

What role should big data play in public health?

Can Web Search Predict Cancer? Promise And Worry Of Big Data And Health

5:48pm June 10, 2016

by Alina Selyukh

Microsoft researchers say in a new study that Bing searches held clues to pancreatic cancer diagnoses. But what role should new data streams like Web searches and social media play in public health?

Politics & Government

Trump's Disinterest In Data Has Some Republicans Worried

11:26am May 31, 2016

by Scott Detrow

The decision to eschew "microtargeting" and other sophisticated tools could have a significant negative effect on Republican candidates down the ballot from Donald Trump.

Queue Listen Now

The Kavli HUMAN Project aims to capture data over 20 years based on the lives of 10,000 people, centered in New York.

Science

Can Big Data Resolve The Human Condition?

1:58pm April 26, 2016

by Adam Frank

What makes the Kavli HUMAN Project, which will follow 10,000 people over 20 years, so exciting is that it's exactly the kind of approach that can show us if Big Data really works, says Adam Frank.

Big Data Predicts Centuries Of Harm If Climate Warming Goes Unchecked

6:26pm November 30, 2015

by Nell Greenfieldboyce

It took about 30 teams of scientists worldwide, using supercomputers to churn through mountains of data, to see patterns aligning of what will happen decades and centuries from now.

Queue Listen Now

(Left to right) NYU medical students Brian Chao, Michael Lui, Hye Min Choi, and Varun Vijay take the team approach to learning about the anatomy of cells, and how disease can disrupt them. Analyzing big data sets is now a routine part of their studies, to

Medical Students Crunch Big Data To Spot Health Trends

6:13pm October 30, 2015

by Julie Rovner

It's not enough anymore to learn how to size up the symptoms of a particular patient, say specialists in bioinformatics. Modern doctors need to learn to see patterns in huge data sets, too.

Queue Listen Now