concatenate two columns of dataframe into 3 column pandas code example

Example 1: python - join two columns and transform it as index

df = DataFrame({'var_1':['a','b','c'], 'var_2':[1, 2, 3], 'var_3':['apple', 'banana', 'pear']})
cols = ['var_1', 'var_2']    # Set columns to combine
df['combined'] = df[cols].apply(lambda row: ', '.join(row.values.astype(str)), axis=1)

# Define which column is index
df_i = df.set_index('combined') 

# Set the index to None
df_i.index.names = [None]

Example 2: how to merge two column pandas

DataFrame["new_column"] = DataFrame["column1"] + DataFrame["column2"]