How safely do you handle your data? Privacy officer Eric van Hoof assists researchers and staff with this. 'The biggest mistake people make is thinking they have nothing to hide.' He has some useful tips.

‘Raising awareness of the disorder is crucial since borderline personality disorder (BPD) still faces considerable stigma ’, says Anne Krause-Utz (Clinical Psychology) . Together with an international team of excellent scientists, Krause-Utz provides an update of current knowledge about this disorder,…

Leiden University has recently received various petitions from students and staff concerning our ties with Israeli universities. We have also held extensive discussions with the University Council in response to questions raised on the subject. We think it important that our partners and research projects…

The EU’s programme for research and innovation Horizon Europe is funding the ISGA project ‘NET-ROL: Networks and the Rule of Law: Uncovering Socio-Economic Outcomes’. The funding amounts to 3 million euros, with 760,000 euros going to ISGA. Researchers Antoaneta Dimitrova and Jaroslaw Kantorowicz are…

The National ThinkTank presents an analysis and seven solutions to the social issue of ‘meaningful ageing’.

Three Leiden students who have made their dreams of studying abroad come true this year with the aid of a VSBfonds scholarship talk about their experiences.

When and how to use the concept of “culture” . To medical anthropologists this is a core question, but also a challenging one.

Sarah Cramsey was appointed professor by special appointment of Central European Studies at the Institute of History on 14 September. 'I am keen to incorporate different scholarly approaches into my work and raise the profile of Central European Studies in Leiden.'

It is with deep sorrow that we share the news that our dear colleague Andrea Evers passed away on Monday, 4 August 2025. Since 2013, Andrea had been affiliated with the Faculty of Social and Behavioural Sciences at Leiden University as Professor of Health Psychology. She was an undeniable driving force…

Gaan vaders minder werken als andere vaders dat ook doen? Helpt betaald ouderschapsverlof hen om meer op te pakken in het huishouden? Hoe bepalend zijn sociale normen voor verschillen op de arbeidsmarkt? Onderzoeker Max van Lent gaat het uitzoeken.

Limburg lawyer Roger Cox has caused a legal revolution. With high-profile cases against the Dutch state and Shell oil company, he transformed the law into a tool to enforce climate policy. Leidraad alumni magazine spoke to him about a life defined by radical choices for a better world.

Interviewing pupils and brainstorming with judges and lawyers. Students from the Trust in the Rule of Law honours course discovered how pupils at the Edith Stein College school in The Hague see institutions and how the law works in practice.

‘Everyone’s talking about it, everyone thinks everyone else is doing it, but the reality is disappointing,’ says biochemist Gerard van Westen in his 3 October University lecture in the Van der Werfpark. In the full marquee, he gets a laugh with this suggestion that artificial intelligence is comparable…

Luca Giomi has the first results of his ERC consolidator grant. He discovered that epithelial cells move collectively but in different ways, depending on the scale you look at. It is hexatic at small scales, and becomes nematic at larger scales: it is a multiscale order. This collective movement of…

‘Yamila Miguel brings along immense enthusiasm that sparks over to the students in the lectures,’ her students say about her. ‘She inspires us as scientists-to-be.’ The astronomer teaches master’s students with great passion and interactivity about exoplanets. She has been nominated for the faculty…

There are approximately 60 million skateboarders worldwide. And yet in the academic world, this culture is not always looked upon seriously. Visual anthropologist Sander Hölsgens believes that this has to change. Last summer his book 'Skateboarding in Seoul' and the accompanying film 'Reverberations'…

On 7 July, the Mayor of Leiden, Peter Heijkoop, visited Leiden Law School. During his visit, he learned about the faculty’s commitment to advancing research and education while contributing to tackling the challenges faced by society.

Starting university is a big step. There is a lot to arrange. The Well-being Ambassadors offer a helping hand to guide you through the practical aspects of student life.

As part of the LIAISON Research Project, Eduard Fosch-Villaronga and Hadassah Drukarch organised a workshop at the European Robotics Forum (ERF 2021) to engage the broader community in the projects’ goal of liaising robot development and policymaking.

What is the relationship between humans and nature like? And how can we use it to tackle climate problems? In the Master Honours Class ‘Planet in Peril’, students approach climate issues from the perspective of the humanities. ‘Things are not always as one-sided as they seem.’

Four researchers from Leiden University will receive funding from arthritis foundation ReumaNederland over the next five years. This should facilitate long-term research into arthritis.

Towards the end of the academic year, many students struggle with study stress. Does the pressure sometimes get too much for you, too? Student psychologist Martine Efting Dijkstra has some tips.

What determines healthy behavior and how do you promote healthy choices and routines? These are a few questions currently being addressed by Marieke Adriaanse, recently appointed Professor of Behavioral Intervention in Population Health Management at the Leiden University Medical Center (LUMC).

In mid-March 2020, the global coronavirus outbreak changed everything in the Netherlands. Staying at home as much as possible and the 1.5 metre rule became the standard. One year on, we reflect on the past year with four Leiden Law School ‘insiders’. What kind of year did they have? And what are their…

Police killed Eric Garner 9 years ago (‘I can’t breathe’) when he resisted a search. Now everyone will consent to stops and searches. Law Professor and author Josephine Ross looks to feminism: what police call consent, feminists would call submission. During the lecture on Wednesday 31 May, Josephine…

Security seems to most people a basic necessity of life, a prerequisite for a good life. But if you think about it a little longer and deeper, as political philosopher Josette Daemen has done, you realise that security sometimes comes at the expense of other important goods, such as freedom and equality.…

Starting with the ‘why’, putting herself in her students’ shoes and providing structure. These are three ways in which environmental scientist Ranran Wang tries to make her course as interesting and manageable as possible. With success: she has been nominated for Science Teacher of the Year 2022.

In this Educatips collumns, Child and Education Studies lecturers share their key insights about teaching. This month: Rachel Plak and Karlijn Pieterse wanted to better prepare students in the course Autism and Diagnostics for clinical practice. That's why they introduced a new type of assignment.

The LUMC has become the first institution in the Netherlands to treat a patient with an autoimmune disease using CAR T-cell therapy.

For the third year in a row, the bonfires in the Duindorp and Scheveningen neighbourhoods in The Hague during New Year's Eve have been cancelled. According to Professor Henk te Velde, the fight for the bonfires represents something bigger: angry citizens.

Welcome to Leiden University

Many children have an unhealthy diet and do not get enough exercise. Sanne de Vries wants to help everyone get a healthy start in life.

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…

We need to be quicker and better at discovering side effects. In her inaugural lecture, Agnes Kant, Professor by Special Appointment of Innovation of Pharmacovigilance, calls for more research on these adverse effects.

Education, Facility

In Ancient Egypt, prominent families engaged in ancestor worship to maintain their high standing. Renata Schiavo researched this link between religion and power for her PhD. ‘People were afraid that their ancestors would bring misfortune if the family’s prestige declined.’

JSixty researchers have received a grant of approximately 50,000 Euros during round 3 of the NWO Open Competition SSH-XS pilot programme. Two of them are working at FGGA: Jolien van Breen and Honorata Mazepus. The sixty researchers received the grant to start working on a promising concept or an innovative…

Healthy University Leiden held its ‘From #COVID to #GOFIT Week’ from 21 to 25 June. Over 600 students and staff found inspiration in a week full of tips and tricks on how to get fit after Covid. So what now? We‘ve compiled a list of tips and activities specially for you. Take a look and enjoy!

The Netherlands cannot stop European labour migrants coming here. Nor does The Hague have much influence on the influx of asylum seekers. But experts believe that we should be able to reduce the need for labour migrants by using intelligent economic policies.

We hebben 6 van de 9 grenzen overschreden die bepalen of menselijk leven in de komende generaties nog mogelijk is op aarde. Kunnen we het tij nog keren?

Lecturer Bastiaan Vuyk recently became team leader of the Department of Bachelor's Education for first-year undergraduate subjects and method, and statistics teaching. With colleagues, he is committed to giving lecturers the space and resources to take students further in their development.

Last Friday the global Antibiotics Awareness Week begun: an entire week dedicated to antibiotic use. Antibiotics researchers from the LACDR therefore set out to tell primary school pupils about their research. Through role-playing, pupils were drawn into the world of antibiotics: 'Can the teacher not…

A consortium led by Eefje Cuppen, Professor Governance of Sustainability at the Institute of Public Administration, has been granted NWO funding for a research project looking into the social, societal, and technical aspects of the energy transition.

As of 1 October, Marlies Reinders (1973) will be the new Dean of the Faculty of Medicine and will sit on the LUMC’s Board of Directors. This will return the board to full strength.

Luca Bruls has received a Catharina Halkes Fonds fellowship grant to finalize her fieldwork in Chad and Senegal and to complete her first ethnographic film.

Anyone in Leiden wanting to join a student association has plenty to choose from. But the risk of alcohol abuse is a very real one. Leiden University, Leiden University of Applied Sciences and dozens of student associations have signed a new alcohol covenant that promises they will do their best to…

Do we break the silences in our research participants’ stories? When is it ethical to write and not write about what remains unspoken in the social worlds we study? And when we encounter silences, how do we document them? These were just some of the many questions discussed during the vivid and inspiring…

Education

Today, 13 May 2024, Leiden University’s Executive Board is publishing the advice of the committee that investigated reports of unacceptable behaviour and breaches of academic integrity. These reports were about a professor from the university and their partner (a former member of the university staf…

Researchers at the Leiden Institute of Advanced Computer Science (LIACS) are collaborating on the development of a conversation tool for patients with breast, prostate and skin cancer. The aim is to create a conversation tool that can support cancer patients in their care and help them make decisions.…