It was a busy turn-out at the first Study Abroad Festival held recently at the Gorlaeus Laboratory on 30 October 2015. Students gathered here to orient themselves - albeit often in an early phase - on studies or work placements abroad.

A research team of fifteen people – representing domains such as political economy, international relations, law, history and public administration - will work on the interdisciplinary programme Citizenship, Migration and Global Transformation. Leiden University has granted 3.5 million euro's to the…

Close contact between women and dogs in prehistoric times Women and dogs were in close contact in the neolithic age of hunters-fishers-gatherers. This has been suggested by Leiden osteoarchaeologist Dr Andrea Waters-Rist and fellow researchers who have studied a tiny biological fossil. The fossil was…

Three decades ago, cyber-diplomacy did not exist. The interest in Information and Communication Technology (ICT) as a vector of change in international relations was limited to a few mostly technical organisations, and a restricted number of states.

Bringing young, enthusiastic and driven academics from different disciplines together, that’s the goal of the Young Academy Leiden (YAL). As a new member, Assistant professor Jan van Rijn is excited to look at AI from different perspective. ‘I want to bring my expertise together with different point…

‘A Muslim and a Jew in the house of God.’ This is how historian Nadia Bouras introduced her recent conversation with colleague Sara Polak in Leiden’s Hooglandse Kerk. They discussed the rising tensions since the outbreak of the Israel-Hamas war. ‘Dare to ask each other questions.’

Twice a year, Gert Renkema, FGGA's Head of Financial Economic Affairs, offers us an insight into all that is going on around FGGA's finances. 'We are still growing strongly as an organisation and had 16% more turnover last year. That's a lot.'

For many students, a summer school abroad is a fun and useful way to spend the summer. This year, because of the travel restrictions, many summer schools were held online. There was no less interest from students though. What is it like to study in a different country, but digitally? Or to travel abroad…

From closed government systems in the Middle East to an exceptionally open Dutch government. Public administration lecturer Alex Ingrams is an expert on transparency: ‘Why are some countries secretive? And what role does technology play?’

In the past decades terrorists have regularly surprised us with unexpected and spectacular attacks, such as the one on the World Trade Centre in New York. How can intelligence services stay one step ahead of them? Consult Charles Darwin and Steven Spielberg is the advice of terrorism expert Yannick…

Types of supervision for prisoners on conditional release include the requirement to report regularly to a parole officer, electronic house arrest or community service. These are all serious measures for the person on whom they are imposed and for society. But it is a subject on which little research…

Plastic pollution is a major environmental issue. Although regulation is being adopted, plastic pollution is still increasing. Effective and strict enforcement is key and NGOs and civilians can be instrumental in this.

This week more than 400 international students are starting their study programme in Leiden or The Hague. Why did they choose to study here? And what is the advice from their mentors?

Seksueel grensoverschrijdend gedrag en structurele sociale onveiligheid horen niet thuis in vrouwengevangenissen, blijkt uit onderzoek van Leidse onderzoekers Esther van Ginneken en Yara Abbing. Zij vinden dat er een ingrijpende cultuurverandering nodig is en doen aanbevelingen.

A tenacious postdoc researcher persuaded Professor Marc Koper to research the oxygen reduction reaction. In Koper's eyes, there was little of interest there. But they promptly discovered a whole new way to improve fuel cells on hydrogen and oxygen. Their article appeared in Nature Catalysis on 07 Ju…

Bankruptcy fraud is not being combatted effectively. When the trustee finds irregularities, the fraudster is not always punished. Politicians and the court case involving fashion chain Miss Etam’s ‘rescuer’ have rekindled the debate on bankruptcy fraud.

Who assembled the collections of museums? The answer to this question seems to point to men as collectors. Apart from for rare exceptions, female collectors hardly seem to exist. Yet there were indeed women collectors. For the project Museums, Collections and Society, researcher Holly O'Farrell will…

Good news for international collaboration: the EU’s International Credit Mobility programme has awarded 163 grants to students and researchers from Leiden University and partner universities in 19 countries outside the EU. The grants are for 19 projects that have arisen from existing partnerships.

Everyone has heard arguments like this before as a child: ‘Whether you like it or not, you have to go to school!’ It seems as though you are presented with two options, but there is only one real outcome. Charlotte van der Voort of the MA Dutch Studies won the Leiden University Thesis Prize on her research…

Electrical signals travel like a wave through our neural pathways. The mathematical models for these movements could not yet properly describe all the biological properties of the nerves. PhD student Willem Schouten-Straatman changed this by improving the existing models. ‘I hope that one day we will…

How do you engage students in times of corona? Sara Brandellero, co-chair of the study programmes for Latin American studies, created assignments that require a wide-ranging set of skills. And the results were beautiful.

We are pleased to announce a call for papers for a conference focused on ethical practices in medical research and treatment in the colonial and postcolonial context.

Animal species that are dear to us in the Netherlands often spend a large part or all of their lifecycle in other parts of the world. But their habitats worldwide are under increasing pressure, are often inadequately protected and much poorer than the global average. ‘If we truly care about these animals,…

Care robots, medical treatments, deepfakes and self-driving cars all with the aid of artificial intelligence (AI). The BrAInpower exhibition at Rijksmuseum Boerhaave shows spectacular applications of AI and explains how it can make such huge leaps. Bas Haring, Professor of Public Understanding of Science,…

Our lecturers had just a week to convert their subjects into online formats. It was an enormous challenge because by no means everyone was involved in remote teaching at Leiden University. As well as being Vice-Dean of Leiden Law School, Ton Liefaard is also a lecturer. ‘I especially want to support…

On September 20, the Austria Centre Leiden and the Leiden Jewish Studies Association convened a panel to celebrate the launch of Prof. dr. Sarah A. Cramsey’s new book Uprooting the Diaspora: Jewish Belonging and the “Ethnic Revolution” in Poland and Czechoslovakia, 1936-1946.

How do you study the growth of microorganisms, the spread of epidemic diseases or the healing of wounds, without actually performing experiments? Daoyi Wang, PhD candidate at the Mathematical Institute, worked on a specific mathematical model that can describe the growth of microorganisms and many other…

Who will win this year’s Teaching Prize in the Faculty of Humanities? Who will the students honour with this coveted token of their appreciation? Read on to get to know four passionate teachers – about minds working at top speed, experimental teaching styles and that satisfying moment when the penny…

How is interdisciplinary collaboration faring at Leiden University? And has disciplinarity been completely abandoned? I’d like to reflect on some concerns among colleagues and on our plans for the future.

He brings order to chaos and analyses satellite swarms. During his PhD research, mathematician Oliver Nagy delved into random networks and how they reach equilibrium. Along the way, he also developed a handy tool. This knowledge is valuable for calculations related to communication networks.

Russian military concepts developed in the late 19th and early 20th centuries still exist and have not lost their strategic relevance. The Russians used them to annex Crimea and are now applying them in the war in Ukraine. Although the concepts have been around for a long time, it does not mean they…

More exercise, a healthier diet, more time to yourself: we make resolutions every year, but they often don't make it past the end of January. To help you succeed this year, we have compiled a list of New Year's resolutions you can put into practice at the University!

Researchers from the Institute of Psychology have secured NWO Open Competition XS grants, each worth up to €50,000. One of the projects explores how making music together can enhance cooperation. Discover more about all five research projects.

Since April 2017 the LUCDH team has received reinforcement in the shape of two brand-new Phd candidates. They will be working on existing projects set up by Victoria Nyst and Sjef Barbiers. I have the pleasure of introducing them here.

We know more together than alone. To increase our university’s impact on the region, we have to be open to the world outside. This is how we strengthen our ties and create new opportunities for teaching and research.

In order to better understand the course of Alzheimer’s disease, Frédérique Kok believes that a strategic and structured approach is needed: the Mastermind research approach. With her LUF grant, Kok wants to generate high-quality data to build a mathematical model that can recognize the onset of the…

This year’s EUSA biannual research conference, which took place in Miami in May 2017, saw a large delegation of the Europa Institute Leiden leaving its mark. In several panels, Prof. Luuk van Middelaar, Dr. Moritz Jesse (Associate Professor at the Europa Institute), Dr. Armin Cuyvers (Assistant Professor…

The Dutch universities are conducting a joint campaign to promote open access: free access to academic and scientific publications. Many Leiden researchers support open access. Given that it involves a shift in the financing from the reader to the author, they point out the need for effective agreements…

Leiden physicists Alexandre Morin and Samadarshi Maity study self-organisation and flocking phenomena. They shed light on flocking, which helps to understand how it is possible that birds in a flock don't collide. With plastic microbeads, they create an experimental setup and they developed a mathematical…

On Wednesday 13 December, Melanie Fink will defend her doctoral thesis ‘Frontex and Human Rights: Responsibility in “Multi-Actor Situations” under the ECHR and EU Public Liability Law’. The defence will take place at 10.00 hrs at the Academy Building of Leiden University, Rapenburg 73. The supervisors…

‘Universities are only the trustees of a complex intellectual heritage that they themselves did not create,’ said Stefan Collini, professor in Cambridge, at the opening of the academic year of Leiden University. He was addressing the question: Who does the university belong to?

On Tuesday 19 December 2017 at 16:15 hrs Anneloes Kuiper-Slendebroek will defend her doctoral thesis 'Rechter over Grenzen' which deals with the application and interpretation of international law in Dutch private law. Supervisor is Martijn Polak, co-supervisor is Jeroen van der Weide.

The Dutch National Research Agenda announced today that it will provide 17 research projects with a total of 61 million euros in funding. Researchers from Leiden University or the Leiden University Medical Center are involved in five of the projects. All of the projects are interdisciplinary partnerships…

Most Leiden master’s students who graduated between October 2016 and September 2018 soon found a job that was related to their degree programme. These are the results of the 2019 Dutch National Alumni Survey (NAE: Nationale Alumni Enquête). The effects of the coronavirus crisis on the labour market…

In the coming years, Hilde De Weerdt gets to spend over three million euros. She received grants from both the European Research Council (ERC) and the Dutch Research Council (NWO) for research on Chinese infrastructure. ‘It is great that it is also possible to develop large projects in the social sciences…

The winner of the highest scientific distinction in mathematics, an explanation for wine tears and much more mathematical theory and application. From 8 to 12 July, 550 mathematicians will meet in the center of Leiden to discuss differential equations.

Leiden University has secured an impressive 12 European exchange grants. This is good news for students, lecturers and researchers from home and abroad.

Every January, students of the Minor Sustainable Development have the opportunity to put what they’ve learned over the last few months into practice in a choice of exciting and practical courses called Area Studies. This year, for the first time, there was a choice of four locations: The Netherlands,…

Victor Gijsbers, university lecturer in Philosophy, has been chosen as a fellow of the Leiden University Teachers' Academy. Over the next five years and with €25,000 to spend, he will be looking for a new interpretation of the Philosophy of Science for Humanities course. ‘Treating a tough and abstract…

That was the question physics and mathematics bachelor’s student Daan de Bos set out to explore during his thesis research. Applying machine learning theories to materials presented several challenges, but his efforts led to a working theory that can now be tested on real materials in laboratories.