On February 16, student Björn Keyser arrived at the California Institute of Technology to do his graduation research project, on human magnetoreception. After months of preparing and a crowdfunding campaign he is on his way. Read updates about his work here.

Leiden chemists have developed a new technique with which they can determine the role of kinases – a group of proteins – in a living cell. This technique makes it easier to find new drug targets for diseases such as cancer and rheumatoid arthritis. The team published the findings in the journal Nature…

Professor Johan Rooryck will be examining cognition and core knowledge systems and how possession is expressed in different languages. Rooryck and fellow researchers have been awarded two NWO grants totalling 2.75 million euro to carry out two research programmes: 'Knowledge and Culture' and 'Lend me…

Human measures to protect lions have an impact on the genetic health of populations. Leiden and Kenyan scientists discovered this by analysing the DNA of 171 Kenyan lions. ‘By fencing reserves, for example, the chance of inbreeding increases.’ With the knowledge and tools from the research, management…

University Lecturer on Middle Eastern cultures Judith Naeff, associated with the Faculty of Humanities, will receive a Veni grant of 250,000 euros. This will allow her to carry out research into Arab documentary and fiction.

The European Research Council has awarded a Starting Grant to five early career scientists from Leiden University. They received funding up to 1.5 million euros to further expand on their research subject.

A restless night aggravates symptoms in those experiencing suicidal thoughts, as psychologists Liia Kivelä and Niki Antypa have found in their study on the short-term risk factors of suicide. They argue that targeting sleep could thus be essential for suicide prevention.

New research has confirmed that the Dutch military used systematic, extreme violence against Indonesians. In his book Soldaat in Indonesië (Soldier in Indonesia), to be released at the end of October, historian Gert Oostindie draws the same conclusions using different sources. He presents new findings…

Eight scientists from Leiden University have been awarded a grant by the Dutch Research Council (NWO). With this Vidi funding, the researchers can set up an innovative line of research and further expand their own research group over the next five years.

To honour the work of its longstanding chair Nick Ryan, CAA International provides the annual Nick Ryan Bursary Award. The Nick Ryan Bursary Award winner is chosen from each year’s student paper presenters. The award goes towards the costs of attending the CAA Conference the following year, up to a…

University lecturer in Chinese and Comparative Philosophy Jingjing Li has been awarded a Veni grant for her research on feminist theories within the Buddhist philosophy of consciousness-only. Jingjing Li explains her plans and the importance of her research.

Two Leiden research projects that focus on increasing the biodiversity of Dutch production systems for food and ornamental horticulture have started thanks to funding from the Dutch Research Council's KIC research programme.

Four scientists from the Faculty of Science will receive a grant of up to 50,000 euros in the Open Competition Domain Science - XS from science financier NWO. This category emphatically strives to encourage curiosity-driven and bold research involving a relatively quick analysis of a promising idea.…

New sampling and analytical strategies give archaeologists a better understanding of the nutrition and survival of ancient populations. Publication in PLOS One.

Recently, NWO has decided to grant two interdisciplinary research proposals for national and international consortia submitted by researchers from the Institute of Biology Leiden. One of the proposals is led by Prof. dr. Ariane Briegel, the other one by dr. Remko Offringa.

Physicists Lucia Bossoni and Martina Huber have been awarded an NWA Ideeëngenerator-grant for research into iron nanoparticles in the brain. These nanoparticles may be linked to air pollution and Alzheimer's disease.

Professor of Computer Science Joost Batenburg has received half a million euros from the Dutch Research Council (NWO) to improve the conservation of historical paintings with 3D X-ray imaging.

Martijn Verkuilen is the winner of the Unilever Research Prize 2022. By transferring DNA from a plant into yeast, he made the first move to produce a new drug for type 2 diabetes. He collected his prize in Wageningen on 24 November.

Jaap Kautz and Johannes Jobst have won the NeVac prize for developing a completely new method for studying electrical conductivity. The article they and their team leader Sense Jan van der Molen wrote about this subject was praised by the jury for its clarity. The prize will be presented to them on…

A delegation from Leiden University recently embarked on a knowledge mission to various NGOs, universities and government organisations in Indonesia. New partnerships were formed and important knowledge exchanged, and researchers from Leiden gave guest lectures.

On behalf of the Dutch Research and Documentation Centre (WODC), Mark Klaassen and Peter Rodrigues, both from the Europa Institute, conducted research on the procedure of imposing immigration detention on foreign nationals who have to return to their country of origin.

NVIC welcomes Dr. Stefanie Van de Peer of Queen Margaret University in Edinburgh as a guest researcher.

An international committee has assessed computer science research at all Dutch universities in the period 2009-2014. For its computer science research, Leiden was awarded the ‘highest’ mark (1) for relevance to society.

Joris Larik, Assistant Professor of Comparative, EU and International Law at LUC The Hague and Convener of the International Justice major, presented his research at the Midyear Meeting of the American Society of International Law, which was hosted by Brooklyn Law School in New York City.

The Dutch organisation for scientific research NWO has announced that it will award an ENW-Klein grant to Marcellus Ubbink (LIC) for his research into the role of temperature in the evolution of enzymes. Sixteen grants have been awarded in total.

LeidenGlobal course ‘Methodologies in the Social Sciences and Humanities’

In October 2021 the Volkskrant published the article 'Rond de bloedgoudmijnen van Burkina Faso heerst de angst voor terreur' (Around the blood-gold mines of Burkina Faso, the fear of terror rules). In this report Carlijne Vos describes how Burkina Faso is rapidly destabilising. The lucrative gold mines…

On 27 October 2017 the Netherlands Aerospace Foundation (NLF) announced the nominations for the NLF Research Award. We are proud of the nomination of our alumna Valentina Vecchio for her thesis, entitled ‘Aerospace Additive Manufacturing; Between Industrial Potential and Legal Challenges’.

In the 4 October, 2017 issue of Nature appeared the comment entitled ‘Scientists have most impact when they're free to move’, an analysis measuring the global movements of researchers and reflecting on the potential adverse consequences that isolationist policies may have on the advance of science.

How does the medieval body of texts known as 'canon law' reflect social and moral ideas? With a combination of AI and an advanced dataset, can we reveal patterns in the transmission and alteration of these ideas over time? Join the SOLEMNE project as a research assistant to explore these questions and…

The Leiden University Centre for the Digital Humanities (LUCDH) is delighted to announce this year's recipients of a Small Grant award. These awards to Leiden University staff and students are intended to foster innovative research in Digital Humanities.

Dr. Eduard Schmidt interviewed a hundred government managers from different ministries who had to perform cuts in own budget to various extents, under the Balkenende, Rutte I and II cabinets. Dr. Schmidt had one central research question: how do public managers in the Dutch government handle austerity…

Mariana Gkliati participated in the International Research Conference of the Association of Human Rights Institutes (AHRI), which took place 2-3 September in Utrecht. The conference was dedicated to the 50 years anniversary of the two UN Human Rights Covenants.

My name is Eliza Steinbock, I’m 38 years old and I was born and raised in Louisville, Kentucky in the United States. I started teaching and researching at Leiden University in 2014. I research and teach gender representation, mostly of transgender people, in media and culture.

This year four research trainee projects were approved by the faculty to be carried out at the Institute for History this semester.

Suddenly getting lost, failing to recognise family members, or forgetting words and names are well-known symptoms of Alzheimer's disease. Psychologists have now discovered that the disease also manifests in more subtle ways: through the rhythm of finger tapping.

Although domestic violence often affects multiple family members, parents and children are usually treated separately for their traumatic experiences. In collaboration with women's shelter Rosa Manus, forensic partner the Waag, the municipality of Leiden and their colleagues from LUBEC (Leiden University…

The Department of Economics at Leiden Law School teaches courses in both Leiden and The Hague to more than 1700 students.

What are the often invisible cognitive consequences of multiple sclerosis? Maureen van Dam mapped these out during her doctoral research. 'People usually notice the physical symptoms, but the cognitive symptoms deserve at least as much attention.'

It was her original Salterio from 1725, built by Michele Barbi, which Franziska Fleischanderl could coincidentally acquire in 2014 that ignited her passion for this special string instrument. Before, she was focussed on contemporary music with modern Hackbrett.

How can we further streamline the development of software for the government? Leiden University and ICTU are to investigate this in a joint research project that was launched on 6 July 2016.

Ross Gildea has won the Institute of Political Science Research Master Thesis Prize 2016. ‘The Political Psychology of Humanitarian Issue (Non-)Adoption in International Politics’ is the crowning achievement of Gildea’s work as a MSc student. The thesis, according to the jury, stands out as a ‘fine…

The "BRAVE NEW WORLD" conference is about how future technology will impact human life. On November 8-9 it is held in Leiden. Two of the invited speakers are researchers and lecturers of the Media Technology program.

By spreading fake news via TV spots and Twitter with the use of Social Bots, Pascal professor Heike Trautmann is investigating the characteristics of fake news. She is calling on Leiden researchers to cooperate in the project.

From medicines from snake venom to supercrops and the origin of words. Thirteen researchers from Leiden University will receive Open Competition XS grants from the Dutch Research Council (NWO).

A research team led by Dr. Yannick Veilleux-Lepage (Institute of Security and Global Affairs) in collaboration with Emil Archambault has secured funding from the Canadian Department of National Defence’s Mobilizing Insights in Defence and Security (MINDS) program to study the use of drones by violent…

Arjen Doelman (Leiden University), Max Rietkerk (Utrecht University), Ehud Meron (Ben-Gurion University of the Negev) and Isla Myers-Smith (University of Edinburgh) received an ERC Synergy grant of 10 million euros with their RESILIENCE project. The researchers will investigate whether and how tipping…

Three of our researchers have been awarded a certificate for receiving enough downloads to be in the top 10% of papers in 2022

With support of several publishers and private foundations, Leiden University Libraries (UBL) and the Scaliger Institute welcome around 15 to 20 Fellows and guests per year to consult and research materials from our Special Collections. The Scaliger Institute received applications this year from domestic…