The development of new environmentally sound technologies is seen as a key route towards achieving sustainability.

This thesis addresses the challenge of sustainable urban development by analyzing the interplay between green and grey infrastructure to optimize resource use and ecosystem services.

Freshwater and brackish water ecosystems are arguably the most vulnerable ecosystems on earth, due to concentrated human developments in and around them. The Pontocaspian (PC) region located at the border of Europe and Asia contains a variety of brackish water ecosystems and unique inhabitants, known…

Promotor: W.T. de Groot

Promotor: Prof.dr. G.R. de Snoo, Co-promotor: R. Heijungs

Mycorrhizas are symbiotic associations between soil fungi and most plant species.

Low-carbon (LE) technologies have a significant potential to reduce the total carbon emissions in China.

Promotor: Prof.dr. G.R. de Snoo

The demand for neodymium-iron-boron (NdFeB) magnets is rapidly growing, while the neodymium supply chain is under pressure. Recycling can alleviate these issues. This thesis investigates the potential for deploying novel magnet recycling technologies and their environmental consequences.

IoT technology poses serval opportunities to supply chains. This thesis employs grey correlation and forecasting models, system dynamics, agent-based modeling, and ex-ante LCA to investigate and quantify the opportunities and risks of IoT-enabled sustainable supply chain operations from both industrial…

Consequences for sediment stability and seston trapping

Mycoheterotrophy is a particular mode of life in which plants obtain carbohydrates from their associated fungal partners, instead of by using photosynthesis.

While ecosystems have concrete benefits for human society, these benefits are typically overlooked in decision-making.

This thesis studied in depth the energy use and CO2 emissions of the industrial sector in China.

Globally and regionally, biodiversity is declining and there are shifts in species’ occurrences and functional traits.

Ethiopian wolves are endangered diurnal Afroalpine rodent hunters. I investigated the interaction between wolves, rodents and human land use in Borena Sayint National Park (BSNP), Abune Yosef and Aboi Gara in Ethiopia.

Promotor: Prof.dr. W.J.G.M. Peijnenburg, Co-promotor: Dr. ing. M.G. Vijver

Promotores: Prof.dr. W.J.G.M. Peijnenburg & Dr. M.G. Vijver

This thesis describes the genetic and prokaryotic diversity of giant barrel sponges.

There is accumulating evidence for an increase in severe global drought events. In particular, Europe experienced several severe droughts in 2003, 2015, and 2018 (unprecedented in the past 2,110 years). Such droughts have caused serious and far-reaching impacts on terrestrial ecosystems.

Wetland plants are distinguished from plants of other terrestrial ecosystems by their adaptations to specific habitat stresses, including waterlogged and flooding and the subsequent abundance of phytotoxic compounds.

Promotores: G. Persoon, R. Schefold

Multi-Angle Dynamic Light Scattering (MADLS) is a technique that is used to determine properties of particles in suspension. The measurements give the hydrodynamic size distribution of individual particles as well as particle clusters, and assists in the interpretation of the stability of the particles…

Promotores: Prof.dr. W.J.G.M. Peijnenburg & Dr. M.G. Vijver

International trade has played a major role in defining the modern global economy. Trade, however, entangles the environmental pressures of economic sectors, giving the illusion of environmental improvements, while the opposite may be occurring.

To limit the effects of climate change, global average temperature since pre-industrial measurements are to be kept well below 2 °C preferably even at 1.5 °C.

Promotor: Prof. dr. Arnold Tukker & Prof. dr. René Kemp (Maastricht University)

Global Environmental Extensions Multi-Regional Input-Output (EE-MRIO) analysis is often used to analyze how changes in global and national demand for products lead to socioeconomic and environmental impacts at the national level.

The rapidly increasing commercial application of metallic nanoparticles within products will inevitably enhance the amount of NPs being released into soil.

Promotor: G.R. de Snoo, Co-promotor: C.J.M. Musters

Novel entities may pose risks to humans and the environment. The small particle size and relatively large surface area of micro- and nanoparticles (MNPs) make them capable of adsorbing other novel entities, leading to the formation of aggregated contamination.

Leiden University research institutes based in Leiden and The Hague.

PNEC-pro is a user-friendly screening tool for professionals dealing with the assessment of surface water quality. The tool calculates local, watertype specific no-effect concentrations (PNEC) of copper, lead, nickel, and zinc based on biotic ligand models (BLMs).

The book ‘Pesticides and the Environment’ gives a transparent overview of facts and figures concerning pesticide use in the Netherlands and the impact of pesticides on the environment.

Promotores: E. van Dijk, G.R. de Snoo. Co-promotor: H. Staats

Natural resources often stretch across borders that separate modern nation states. This can create conflict and limit opportunities for regulated consumption of their goods and services, but also provide opportunities for joint multinational efforts that exceed single country capabilities.

Do you have any questions about the bachelor Science for Sustainable Societies? Please contact us!

A sustainable resource management is an essential aspect to satisfy the current human needs without compromising the needs of future generations.

Do you have questions about the Master Biology? Please contact us!

The expanding population and economic activity are driving up global energy consumption. Simultaneously, there is an urgent need to transition from fossil fuels to renewable sources to mitigate the climate crisis, primarily caused by fossil fuel combustion.

This thesis describes the role of pollution, specifically neonicotinoid insecticides, as an actor of the ongoing biodiversity decline.

The energy system is at the heart of two of the greatest challenges of the 21st century: decreasing CO2 emissions to meet the ambitions of the Paris agreement while fulfilling the growing energy demand associated with the economic aspirations of a growing world population.

Dissolution processes – next to aggregation processes - play an important role for fate prediction and environmental risk assessment of metal-based nanoparticles (MNPs). It is challenging to predict the kinetics of the dissolution process of MNPs in complex systems such as we can find in in vivo and…

Interdisciplinary education and research projects

Assessing the risks of engineered nanomaterials (ENMs) solely on the basis of experimental assays is time-consuming, resource intensive, and constrained by ethical considerations (such as the principles of the 3Rs of animal testing). The adoption of computational toxicology in this field is a high p…

Study information

The global transition toward low-carbon energy systems and the rapid expansion of digital technologies, including artificial intelligence, are reshaping how modern societies produce, move, and process energy and information.

Plant diversity is essential for us and our planet as it sustains the stability of our ecosystems, provides vital materials and food to us and supports many ecosystem services.

Organic amendments applied to agricultural fields can partially offset our carbon emissions to the atmosphere and improve the resilience of agriculture to the effects of climate change. Driving these benefits, however, are complex and poorly understood interactions between organic amendment properties,…

As a non-invasive genetic method, eDNA based approaches have become an important component of ecologists' and environmental managers' toolkits for biomonitoring in conservation and an increasingly important source of ecological knowledge.