To what extent can global issues be solved by multistakeholder collaboration, a relatively new type of organisation? Jan Aart Scholte, the coordinator of the Global Transformations and Governance Challenges (GTGC) interdisciplinary research programme, has received a Dutch Research Council (NWO) grant…

Philosophy has an important contribution to make to society, says Professor of Practical Philosophy Glen Newey. You need people who can think clearly, certainly in positions of power and authority. Newey stresses that “there will always be a place for philosophy”. An introduction to the practically…

From the Republic of Moldova to Italy and from Indonesia to Greece, students from all over the world participated in the Bio-Pharmaceutical Science Summer School 2017. The students got a comprehensive overview of the education and research performed within the LACDR. ‘I am very happy to be here,’ says…

Two new English-taught Bachelor’s programmes ‘Arts, Media & Society’ and ‘Philosophy’ were presented at the Open Day on 15 October. They start next year. Prospective students tell us why they came to the Open Day.

Nienke van der Marel has been awarded the New Horizons Prize in physics for her pioneering research on planet formation. This prize is given to young, promising researchers in physics or mathematics. The astronomer and her colleagues found the first observational evidence for 'dust traps' in disks around…

Writer and columnist Nicolien Mizee will be Leiden University’s new writer in residence from autumn 2023.

Novel language learning activates different neural processes than was previously thought. A Leiden research team has discovered parallel but separate contributions from the hippocampus and Broca's area, the learning centre in the left hemisphere. The right hemisphere of the brain also seems to play…

Jannemieke Ouwerkerk, Professor of European Criminal Law, started as PhD Dean on 1 October in addition to her chair at the faculty. She is looking forward to taking on this new role.

Jan Aart Scholte is the first professor on the new Leiden interdisciplinary programme, Global Transformations and Governance Challenges. He researches how to tackle global challenges such as climate change and inequality. Inaugural lecture on 4 February.

The Executive Boards of Leiden University, Delft University of Technology and Erasmus University Rotterdam have appointed Professor Wim van den Doel as leader of the LDE alliance as of 1 February 2020. He was previously on the Executive Board of the Dutch Research Council (NWO) and Dean of the Faculty…

Dr Mark Leiser, Assistant Professor in Law and Digital Technologies at eLaw - Center for Law and Digital Technologies at Leiden University, has won a grant for research on fake news.

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.

Elise Dusseldorp has been appointed Professor in the Methodology and Statistics of Psychological Research. In the same way that she spends her spare time rambling through the forest, as a professor she sifts through colleagues’ research data. ‘I often come across information that doesn’t appear in the…

Below are some examples of ACPA projects that have a meaningful impact on arts and society. This page will be refreshed every now and then, presenting projects that exhibit how artistic research can significantly contribute to the way we perceive, understand, and relate to the world and to other pe…

Knowledge and culture subproject 4:

This programme adopts a new approach based on the paradoxical nature of these responses in early modern Italy: it draws on rhetorical discussions of lifelikeness and living presence, and it uses the anthropological theory of art as agency developed by Alfred Gell.

In the 19th century, Old English poems were claimed as cultural heritage by various non-Anglophone nations, including Scandinavians, Germans and Dutch. These competing nationalistic, cultural appropriations happened against the backdrop of a growing interest in early medieval English language and literature…

Studying one another’s languages and cultures fosters understanding between groups of people, which leads to more equality, along with increased economic, administrative, and cultural cooperation.

The construction of 285 student studios on land owned by Leiden University is a step closer. On Thursday, student housing organisation DUWO and the Real Estate department of the University signed the leasehold agreement for the parcel of land in the Oegstgeest part of the Leiden Bio Science Park.

Unconventional superconductors form one of the big mysteries in physics. Among them is strontium ruthenate, which stands out as a controversial superconductor. During his PhD, Leiden physicist Kaveh Lahabi has provided new insights into the nature of superconductivity in this material, leading to a…

Leiden University will be opening a new Student Centre in The Hague, in the Orion Building at Turfmarkt. The Centre will have room for social and cultural activities, study workplaces and a fitness room for the growing number of students and staff at the Hague Campus.

Mathematician Stéphanie van der Pas and psychologist Sandy Overgaauw have been nominated for the New Scientist science talent competition, a prize for the most talented scientist in the Netherlands and Flanders.

‘The Oscars of the natural sciences’, is what they are called: the Breakthrough Prizes awarded annually in America by the Breakthrough Foundation. Part of this are the New Horizons prizes for early-stage researchers. Sebastiaan Haffert, researcher at the Observatory, is this year's winner.

King Willem-Alexander visited Leiden on 6 December to open the new wing of the Leiden Instrumentmakers School. Students of this vocational programme make instruments needed for scientific research.

The new minor ‘The (un)just society’ will start in September 2024. We asked Judi Mesman some questions about this new minor.

It is still not easy to ‘come out’ about your sexual orientation or gender identity. On Coming Out Day (11 October), the issue was the focus of global attention. This year, instead of the traditional rainbow flag, the ‘progress pride flag’ flew above University buildings.

Nusantara Capital Authority (OIKN), which is in charge of developing Indonesia’s new capital city entered a Memorandum of Understanding with Leiden-Delft-Erasmus Universities on 18 March on knowledge sharing and joint research.

Our courses September courses start soon, be sure to apply in time

As of 1 May Gianne Derks is the new Scientific Director of the Mathematics Institute. Derks succeeds Hermen Jan Hupkes who temporarily assumed the role. Derks has been appointed for a period of four years.

Jasper Williams has been appointed as the new Operational Director of CML. He is succeeding Paul de Hoog, who held the position for over eleven years, initially as Institute Manager and later as Operational Director. Williams will assume the position on 1 February.

Leiden physicist Anne Meeussen has been nominated for the title of New Scientist Science Talent. She will be up against 14 young scientists from other Dutch and Belgian universities. The polls are already open!

As of 1 July, Marcellus Ubbink is the new Scientific Director of the Leiden Institute for Chemistry. He will succeed Hermen Overkleeft, who led the institute since 2017. Ubbink has been appointed for a period of four years.

'A great result for the effect of Pokémon Go on children with autism', says Carolien Rieffe in the Dutch newspaper De Volkskrant. 'Although we do not know whether the game will lead to friendships in the long term.'

We are happy to introduce our new Assistant Director for Egyptology & Archaeology: Dr Ariel Singer

The Leiden Center for the Study of Ancient Arabia (LeiCenSAA) announces a new open access, peer-reviewed journal dedicated to the epigraphy of Arabia and its cultural and linguistic context: Arabian Epigraphic Notes

Koenraad Schalm will be the new programme director of the Physics master starting 1 November. He has been appointed for a period of four years. Schalm succeeds Ana Achúcarro who has held the position since 2021.

On Tuesday 11 January 2022, the Meijers Lecture and the New Year's reception took place at 16.00 hrs.

In the book 'Slave in a Palanquin: Colonial Servitude and Resistance in Sri Lanka' Nira Wickramasinghe, professor of Modern South Asian Studies, uncovers the traces of slavery in the history and memory of the Indian Ocean world. She was interviewed about the book in the New Books in South East Asian…

“I’m determined to innovate the healthcare system to suit the needs of an ageing population.” As the student ambassador, Merel Vangeel will be the first contact for prospective students who are curious about the Master Vitality and Ageing. She will use her own expertise of the master’s to advise new…

What happens if you are an academic forced to flee your home country and find yourself here in the Netherlands with practically nothing? The Hestia scheme offered by the Dutch Research Council (NWO) gives refugee scientists the opportunity to resume their academic career in the Netherlands. The scheme…

After two years of corona restrictions, it was ‘back to normal’ in 2022. Migration, elections, the history of slavery, Russia, and Ukraine were much-discussed topics. We compiled an overview of the most-read news items and other events of the past year.

Online, hybrid, on campus... It was an unpredictable year, also for the Faculty of Humanities. Luckily, there were also non-corona related stories. Let's review 2021 with this list of the most-read news articles per month.

Maria Boletsi has received a fellowship from the Netherlands Institute for Advanced Study (NIAS) within the framework of the Theme Group Project The Politics of (De)familiarization: The Common and the Strange in Contemporary Europe.

To truly understand Dutch literature, we have to look beyond borders. At least, that is the view of Sander Bax. From 1 August, he will be Professor of Contemporary Dutch Literature and Culture in a Transnational Dynamic.

Many thanks for visiting the Master’s Open Day on Friday 15 March! We hope that you enjoyed the day and that all your questions were answered.

Following the success of the Dutch version, the podcast 'Scandal and Controversy in Russian Literature' is now also available in English. Senior University Lecturer Otto Boele guides listeners through eight infamous texts in this version.

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Early diagnosis, new treatments, and personalised care: all of these are possible if we can better unlock the wealth of information hidden in health data. Unfortunately, this data is often poorly organised, difficult to access, and not interoperable. The new international Leiden Institute for FAIR and…

Archaeological finds off the coast of Java, Indonesia provide insight into the world of Homo erectus, 140,000 years ago. Skull fragments and other fossil remains provide a unique picture of how and where these early humans lived, says Leiden archaeologist Harold Berghuis.