Identifying pathogens with a mobile testing kit, even in remote areas. Rapidemic, a student team of Leiden, are trying to make it possible. Now, they moved on to the finals of the Most innovative student of the Netherlands.

In a new article in the journal Scientific Reports, Leiden archaeologist Wei Chu and colleagues report on recent excavations in Western Romania at the site of Româneşti, one of the most important sites in southeastern Europe associated with the earliest Homo sapiens. The site gives an important glimpse…

Sport brings people together. This became clear on 9 April during the official opening of the new University Sports Centre. In a varied programme with live sports acts and even a basketball session with an Olympic champion, sport, history and human connection came together in a building designed for…

Michiel Hogerheijde has been appointed Vice-Dean of the Faculty of Science as of 1 January 2027. He succeeds Bart de Smit, who has held the position since 2019. Hogerheijde is looking forward to working together with students and staff. ‘Good education is something you create together.’

Laura Kamsma (31) has been coordinating the International Office (IO) of FGGA for a few months now. An introduction to the ambitious Nijmegen native, who has set herself the goal of making the International Office more visible: 'Knock on our door if you have an internationalisation issue. Now you can…

A study association is a good way to combine study-related activities with pleasure. Every faculty has one or more study association.

3 October University has become something of a tradition: a bit of science among the Leidens Ontzet celebrations. During the new and improved edition, the WetenschapsWarenMarkt (Science Market), visitors spoke to researchers about the nitrogen problem, making organs and the city’s connections with A…

Professor André Baranski is a champion for improving organ procurement. He believes there should be standardised training and certification for procurement surgeons. This is what he said in his inaugural lecture on 16 April.

Researcher Femke Reidsma has been awarded a prestigious Rubicon grant. With this fellowship, she will spend two years conducting research at Harvard University, where she will join a leading paleoecology laboratory.

Starting April 2026, Niels van Willigen will join the Institute of Political Science at Leiden University’s Faculty of Social and Behavioural Sciences as Professor by Special Appointment in Strategic Studies. This appointment was made possible by the Atlantische Commissie, which established this chair…

Study career, professional development, and labour market preparation.

Conference

Lecture, Tuesday Talk

An Honours Class about the ostensibly unrecognisable worlds of insular Southeast Asia teaches students a fundamental piece of wisdom: "We do not differ much from the people at the other end of the world."

How do fats and enzymes in the brain contribute to multiple sclerosis? In his PhD research, Daan van der Vliet combined chemistry and neuroscience to gain new insights into how brain disorders develop.

Lecture, Economic and Social History Brown Bag Seminar

In this series the Vice-Dean and portfolio holder of education in the board of the Faculty of Archaeology reflects on the state of education.

Marco van Eijk is the new Educational Director of the Bachelor's Life Science and Technology (LST). Since 1 September he has been responsible for ensuring the quality of the programme. ‘LST is a unique programme and everyone has to keep working hard for that. That is my main task.’

Professor Ton Liefaard has worked to improve the position of children since his academic career began.

No less than six Leiden projects received a grant for quantum research from the national growth programme Quantum Delta NL and the NWO. After all, in order to boost quantum technology not only industry is needed, but also science. Research towards new sensors, faster algorithms and quantum materials,…

Even when a border has officially disappeared, it is still people who decide whether others may cross freely. This was also true for the Polish-German border, where PhD candidate Maryla Klajn spend six months conducting fieldwork.

Every year in February, ninety students who love making music come together in Someren, a town in the Dutch province of North Brabant. Through rehearsals and festivities over ten days, they transform into the latest version of the Dutch Student Orchestra (NSO), which then performs concerts in the Netherlands…

Alternative demonstrations were held in Leiden and The Hague on Thursday 14 November after the national protest in Utrecht was cancelled. Leiden University supports these protests, which were organised by WOinActie. Read our live blog of the demonstrations.

A new collaborative monograph of democratic theory, The Sciences of the Democracies, was released by UCL Press on August 7. The book, in the style of a democratic manifesto, is written by a large number of co-authors in a bold attempt to expand and deepen how democracy is studied and understood. Among…

In the middle of doing research for her master’s thesis, Sara Kalf (24) was hit by a car and got seriously injured. After a long period of rehabilitation and hard work, this week she can finally add her signature to the wall of the Academy Building’s ‘Sweat Room’.

Incoming exchange Erasmus forms, transcripts, grades and credits

Once a year, former employee and avid runner Dennis Hoencamp returns to his old workplace. That’s when he competes in the Leiden Science Run. As an event coordinator, he once devised the relay race as an anniversary activity. It grew into an annual event for the entire University and the Bio Science…

The Common Market Law Review (CML Rev), one of the oldest and most prestigious journals in the field of European Union law, has its editorial office here at the Faculty of Law in Leiden

From research on stellar winds to sign language: an impressive seven researchers from Leiden University will receive a prestigious Vici grant from the Dutch Research Council (NWO).

Minerva, which calls itself the oldest student association of the Netherlands, has the reputation of being an impenetrable bastion. A lustrum exhibition shows the turbulent history and points to a diversity of contacts: from close bonds with Leiden ‘coffee ladies’ to the visit of Sir Winston Churchi…

Now that war is once again raging in Europe, the question of when you need to stand up against injustice has become more relevant than ever. In his Cleveringa lecture on 24 November historian Gert Oostindie will discuss why colonial domination was not regarded as an issue in Leiden for a long time.

As geopolitical tensions rise and the international landscape becomes increasingly volatile, the Netherlands faces a growing range of threats, from cyber attacks and disinformation to foreign interference and social unrest. In the new executive programme Strategy and a Resilient Rule of Law, researchers…

Assistant professor Daniel Schade of Leiden University was a guest on various German-language media outlets, discussing the state of the Schengen Agreement after 30 years.

The Leiden University Fund (LUF) invites researchers of all faculties to submit applications for the Leiden Empowerment Fund (LEF).

Nano-plastics cause malformations. Meiru Wang, researcher at the Institute of Biology Leiden, looked at the extreme effects polystyrene nano-particles could have, using chicken embryos as a model. Her results were quite alarming. Especially as nano-particles are everywhere. In the air, floating through…

The Leiden University Visual Ethnography collection has been added to Alexander Street Press, an educational streaming video service. The master’s specialization Visual Ethnography has supported many talented individuals to produce inspiring films. About 70 master’s thesis films of the past 8 years…

A delegation from Leiden University visited the Netherlands Institute Morocco (NIMAR) in Rabat at the end of February.

Festival

Everything biobased: Plastic, medicine and fuel. It seems like a futuristic utopia. But for how long? A collaboration of researchers now proposes an idea to accelerate the development process. By combining machine learning and laboratory automation, this biobased ideal may become a reality rather sooner…

Conducting fieldwork against a backdrop of public policy interests and professional reputations in your own place of residence adds a whole new level to the experience. As a researcher in this context, you are essentially caught in a game of piggy in the middle between the subjects of policy, the objects…

An international team led by astronomers at Leiden University has shown in laboratory experiments that sulfur can bind with ammonium under icy cosmic conditions and form a salt that sticks to dust and pebbles. The resulting sulfur salt not only helps to explain the mystery of the missing sulfur gas,…

Leiden University and Stadslab Leiden invite you to improve the Leiden and The Hague environment with 450 extra trees – a living reminder of 450 years since the Relief of Leiden and the foundation of Leiden University.

Leiden is proud to announce that the city has been selected to host the 33rd Annual Meeting of the European Association of Archaeologists (EAA), scheduled for 25-28 August 2027.

As a Leiden University’s master’s student in Political Science you conduct independent research and report your findings to fellow academics and, who knows, to a larger audience. Your thesis is a showcase of your academic skills and personal interest, and perhaps even passion. Easier said than done,…

By making use of artificial tax arrangements via the Netherlands and other countries, corporations and wealthy individuals worldwide together manage to avoid paying $472 billion in tax.

The many thousands of small celestial bodies beyond Neptune’s orbit may have ended up there due to a star that passed close to the solar system billions of years ago. This is shown by Leiden simulation expert Simon Portegies Zwart, along with his German and Dutch colleagues. ‘We are answering several…

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Welcome to Leiden University

Lecture, Com(parative) Syn(tax) Series