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5.2 \twocolumn

Synopsis:

     \twocolumn[text1col]

The \twocolumn declaration starts a new page and produces two-column output. If the optional text1col argument is present, it is typeset in one-column mode before the two-column typesetting starts.

These parameters control typesetting in two-column output:

\columnsep
The distance between columns (35pt by default).
\columnseprule
The width of the rule between columns; the default is 0pt, so there is no rule.
\columnwidth
The width of the current column; this is equal to \textwidth in single-column text.

These parameters control float behavior in two-column output:

\dbltopfraction
Maximum fraction at the top of a two-column page that may be occupied by floats. Default ‘.7’, can be usefully redefined to (say) ‘.9’ to avoid going to float pages so soon.
\dblfloatpagefraction
The minimum fraction of a float page that must be occupied by floats, for a two-column float page. Default ‘.5’.
\dblfloatsep
Distance between floats at the top or bottom of a two-column float page. Default ‘12pt plus2pt minus2pt’ for ‘10pt’ and ‘11pt’ documents, ‘14pt plus2pt minus4pt’ for ‘12pt’.
\dbltextfloatsep
Distance between a multi-column float at the top or bottom of a page and the main text. Default ‘20pt plus2pt minus4pt’.