Leiden researchers have discovered an enzyme that helps bacteria feed on everyday plastics. This common enzyme could play a crucial role in future research and eventually in addressing the global plastic crisis. The study was published in Nature Communications.

Students from the Royal Academy of Art The Hague (KABK) designed the 450 lustrum logo.

Astronomers led by Simon Portegies Zwart used simulations to reconstruct how three stars were ejected from the star cluster R136, 60,000 years ago. The analysis reveals that five stars were involved in the event in the Tarantula Nebula.

This summer, the COBRA Museum will be focusing on Moroccan art. 'The other story' exhibition presents for the first time Moroccan modernism in the Netherlands. The Netherlands Institute Morocco (NIMAR) contributed to its exhibition

Try to resolve the nitrogen problem, go on a regeneration journey or take part in psychological research: discover this and more at the new and improved 3 October University, ‘WetenschapsWarenMarkt’.

The International Day of Light (IDL) celebrates the ubiquitous role light has in our lives. From Argentina to South Africa, Japan and Pakistan, several events have taken place across all continents on May 16. The date is a token for people around the globe to connect with the importance of light in…

With the childcare benefits scandal in the Netherlands, certain interests in society were hidden for long to politics and governance. With the farmers’ protests, on the other hand, the major economic and political interests at stake were hidden for long to society. In her inaugural lecture on 16 September,…

Professor of Political Science Ruud Koole was made an Officer of the Order of Oranje Nassau on the occasion of his valedictory lecture on 13 December. The Mayor of Leiden, Henry Lenferink, presented him with the decorations associated with this honour.

The pandemic has challenged us to revisit the way we structure education and how to reach out to students remotely. It almost seems fitting that a course devoted to a topic so closely related to the context of the corona crisis, that of global health, would explore the possibilities of making the course…

After almost twenty years the record for the most distant radio galaxy has been broken. A team of astronomers led by Leiden PhD candidate Aayush Saxena has discovered a radio galaxy from the time when the universe was just one billion years old. The galaxy is at a distance of 12 billion light years…

Twee teams of astronomers, including from the universities of Amsterdam and Leiden, have discovered how hot gas giants are surrounded by large halos of thin helium gas, an indication that they are slowly losing their atmosphere. The helium, that was recently seen for the first time by the Hubble space…

The doctrine of German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche is complex, contradictory and open to a range of different interpretations. As a result, his legacy has been adopted by both violent fascists and liberal pluralists. However, as James Pearson shows, the true Nietzsche lies somewhere in between these…

PhD research recently completed by pharmacologist Margreke Brill shows that morbidly obese patients should be given a different dosage of the drugs Cefazolin and Midazolam. This could also apply to other drugs such as anti-cancer drugs as well as antibiotics and Margreke Brill is advocating a change…

Lenses from Christiaan Huygens’ telescope, instruments used to demonstrate Newton’s laws, and equipment that led to the discovery of superconductivity—around 3,000 scientific instruments from the Faculty of Science at Leiden University are now officially part of the Rijksmuseum Boerhaave collection.…

Are you keen to immerse yourself in a new culture, broaden your horizons and make friends for life? If so, come to the Study Abroad Festival on Friday afternoon 14 October.

Another year has reached its end. And what a year it has been! On December 4th staff and students of the Faculty of Archaeology came together to celebrate and reminisce. The event's central topic was the end of Jan Kolen's term as Dean. Martina Revello Lami moderated the event.

With her Veni research, investigator Rosanne Baars from the Institute of History aims to demonstrate that women played a role in the eighteenth-century diplomatic circles of the Ottoman Empire. ‘We already know that one woman led the entire embassy.'

The relationship between Iran and Saudi Arabia is worse than ever. According to Iran specialist Maaike Warnaar, it will be difficult to achieve peace in the region if there is no rapprochement between the two countries.

This masterclass examines the idea of disegno in relation to the early modern decorative arts by investigating the collection of Italian design drawings in the Rijksmuseum. Meaning both design and drawing, disegno was a fundamental concept in the development of artistic theory in early modern Europe…

As a doctor, coming to a decision together with a patient: how do you do that in the best possible way? Researchers Geert Warnar and Roosmaryn Pilgram, who jointly teach a course within the MA in Dutch Studies, are entering into a virtual collaboration with the Universidade NOVA de Lisboa to find the…

Leiden University will continue to offer its BA in Italian Language and Culture. The Board of the Faculty of Humanities has reversed its decision to stop admitting new students as of the 2026/2027 academic year.

Sinds vorig jaar staan er gekleurde pilaren op de universiteitscampus. Met deze ‘Act of Kindness Pillars’ wordt eenzaamheid bij studenten tegengegaan.

With the help of software that mimics a human brain, ESA’s Gaia satellite spotted six stars zipping at high speed from the centre of our Galaxy to its outskirts. This could provide key information about some of the most obscure regions of the Milky Way.

Why doesn't the Surinamese resistance hero and independence fighter Anton de Kom have a memorial site in his former hometown, The Hague, while there are streets named after colonial leaders? The students of university lecturer Anne Marieke Van der Wal-Rémy are committed to the erection of a statue.

In 1808, the United States banned the transatlantic slave trade. Not everyone was happy about this, as Marcella Schute discovered. In her thesis, she shows how politicians from Louisiana made serious attempts to restart the slave trade in the mid-nineteenth century.

How can a single origami crease pattern be folded into two precisely defined target shapes? Researchers at AMOLF and Leiden University have created an ‘alphabet’ of 140 origami ‘puzzle pieces’ that allows them to do just that, as described today in Nature Physics. This discovery could help in the construction…

On Tuesday 6 September, the faculty year 2022-2023 got off to a great start with Leiden Law Op 1, our yearly talkshow live from the Kamerlingh Onnes Gebouw. Together with the Faculty Board, academic staff and students, we looked ahead to the upcoming academic year.

Leiden University College The Hague (LUC) is celebrating its fifth anniversary. This English-language programme with on-campus teaching for excellent students has proved to be a great success. On Saturday 10 October, the LUC will be celebrating in Diligentia Theatre in The Hague with numerous speakers,…

From documentaries, zines and exhibitions to a video installation. Students of the Visual Ethnography master's programme pulled out all the stops to finish their studies in a fantastic way. For one year, the 23 students worked on their own multimedia projects. The screening of the projects took place…

Video projections in contemporary art are convincing not because they depict reality, but because they show new possibilities within that reality. Artist Sophie Ernst demonstrates this in a thesis and an exhibition. She defends her PhD on 8 December.

Suddenly there they were, the Russian soldiers near the border of Ukraine. Since then, reports of tensions between Russia on the one hand and the United States and Europe on the other have dominated the news. What is going on? An interview with Russia expert André Gerrits.

Koen Bastiaans and his colleagues discovered a new quantum liquid unlike anything ever seen. They did it by using a technique that can be compared to listening to the sound of raindrops falling on a roof. Publication in Science 29 October.

Dwarf satellite galaxies in the Milky Way perform different dances than researchers initially expected. Marius Cautun from Durham University received a Marie Curie grant to unravel the mysteries of this orbital dance. October 1st 2018 he will start his research at the Leiden Observatory.

With the end of the year coming to a close, it is time for a celebration. Twenty driven lecturers, among them 5 academic staff members of the Faculty of Governance and Global Affairs in The Hague, were awarded their Senior Teaching Qualification by Vice- Rector Magnificus Hester Bijl.

Fanny Wonu Veys was appointed Professor of Art and Material Culture of Oceania on 1 August. Time for an introduction.

Liselotta Jahnke, Jason Irwin, Rachel Cruickshank and Paula Kovač are the new student members of the Programme Committee (OLC). This committee advises the Executive Board and the Faculty Board of CADS about educational matters, such as determining the Course and Examination Regulations and evaluating…

Ever since the foundation of Leiden University in 1575, philosophy in Leiden has been committed to open-mindedness, dialogue, and comparative perspectives. In line with this tradition it makes perfect sense to question the widespread self-image of philosophy as well. Is philosophy the exclusive privilege…

Successful innovation requires more than technological progress alone. Every new concept must first be firmly anchored into an existing context. At least this is the hypothesis of Dutch classicists, working together in the National Research School in Classical Studies OIKOS. They intend to test this…

Alumnus Allard Altena (27) is mentor of the month. He worked at the Public Prosecution Service and is now a regulator at the Dutch Authority for the Financial Markets (AFM). He wants to share his broad experience with students and young alumni – you too perhaps?

Working for a social client during your studies: this is what happens at Urban Studies. For the course Urban Studies in Practice, third-year students carry out projects for public clients, such as the municipality of The Hague.

In September 2016, the educational programme Universe Awareness (UNAWE) implemented a series of educational activities at Basisschool De Verrekijker, a primary school for refugee children in Katwijk, the Netherlands.

Mozambican politician and child rights activist Graça Machel will receive an honorary doctorate from Leiden University for her commitment to the rights of women and children in Africa and elsewhere. She will be awarded the honorary doctorate on the Dies Natalis, the University’s foundation day, on 8…

Since the beginning of September, Emma van der Plas (20) is the new student ambassador for CADS. Emma is a third-year student and is currently following a minor in Sustainable Development in Leiden. Her goal? To eliminate the stigmas surrounding anthropology.

Professor of Sociology of Law Maartje van der Woude has been appointed as the new Director of the Honours College Law (HC Law). She will succeed Sjoerd Douma on 1 January 2017. HC Law is one of the faculty expertise programmes of the Honours College that is open to students studying one of the law programmes…

Two black holes, in close orbit around each other. Have they slowly drifted together, or did they emerge from two orbiting stars? Together with to colleagues form Amsterdam, Leiden astronomer Simon Portegies Zwart calculated that the second scenario is rather likely.

Two Leiden University science communication projects have been awarded a WECOM grant through the Dutch Research Agenda (NWA). One project is a study of the history of the deaf community in the Netherlands and the other is of a condition that causes people to lose their way.

The combination of data science and sports is a hot topic. In a talk during the opening of the Academic Year at the Faculty of Science, Professor Joost Kok explained what data analytics can teach us about sports.

Bioenergy with carbon capture and storage (BECCS) is a promising method for removing carbon dioxide (CO2) from the atmosphere and simultaneously generating energy. Yet this method is controversial, as it may require a great deal of land and water. Researchers at Leiden University have now proposed a…

A new study published in Archaeometry describes the unexpected results obtained from analyses of five human teeth discovered in a ritual cache at an enslaved African plantation site on the island of Saba in the Caribbean.

Graphene floating on water does not repel water, as many researchers believe, but rather attracts it. This has been demonstrated by chemists Liubov Belyaeva and Pauline van Deursen and their supervisor Grégory F. Schneider. Publication in Advanced Materials.