2017 was the Leiden Asia Year. Leiden has had connections with Asia and built up extensive knowledge of the continent over many centuries. This Leiden-Asia link has been in the spotlight for the past year.

Leiden University is an internationally oriented Dutch university, where we communicate with one another in both Dutch and English. To ensure that we handle this bilingual convention with due care, the Executive Board has established a set of guidelines on language policy. These guidelines set out the…

Ten projects have been selected during the fourth call in the Seed Funding Programme launched by EUniWell. Marieke Liem, Professor Social Resilience and Security, has received a grant for the MASTERY project.

At the first Climate Café of 2025, we celebrated the one-year anniversary of The Hague Climate Agreement and reflected together on the successes and opportunities for the future.

The Institute of Security and Global Affairs (ISGA) organizes the ISGA Conference ‘Who determines the security (research) agenda’ on 9 - 10 November 2016 in The Hague, the Netherlands.

Leiden University Libraries (UBL) has been able to acquire an exceptional two-volume Miao album. The acquisition was made possible by the Rombouts Fund for Chinese collections. The extraordinarily well-preserved work contains 70 full-page paintings on silk, depicting non-Chinese peoples in the area…

ESA’s Gaia mission has produced the richest star catalogue to date, including high-precision measurements of nearly 1.7 billion stars and revealing previously unseen details of our home Galaxy.

From Wednesday-Thursday 19-20 April 2023 the Stichting Bob Wessels Insolvency Law Collection (BWILC) invites PhD students from Europe and beyond to participate in the 5th edition of the PhD workshop on European/International Insolvency Law. Following four successful editions, PhD students are invited…

Journalists in the Netherlands are unhappy about the handling of their requests under the Dutch Open Government Act (Wet open overheid, Woo). They say these requests take too long, produce too little results, and that communication could be better.

Can we use quantum computers in a way that is also relevant to society? With the help of a 2-million-euro NWA grant, Leiden University will work with partners such as Surf, Google and Volkswagen to demonstrate that quantum computers are also of value outside the lab.

An international team of astronomers from Leiden Observatory and others, has for the first time mapped a piece of the dark, cosmic web. The research strengthens the hypothesis that the young universe consisted of huge numbers of small groups of newly formed stars. The astronomers publish their findings…

Data science is of vital importance in preventing future outbreaks of viruses, Professor of Data Science Aske Plaat argues. Inaugural lecture entitled ‘Data Science and Ebola’ on 13 April.

Welcome to the WIIS NL community! We are excited to be launching our newsletter in the week we celebrate International Women's Day.

Patients on patient forums share all sorts of things about their illness: from side effects and advice to messages of support. PhD candidate Anne Dirkson uses artificial intelligence (AI) to retrieve this information. ‘Ninety per cent of the side effects weren’t officially registered.’

Chemist Sander van Kasteren aims to accurately map how our immune system responds to vaccines, particularly those aimed at curing diseases like cancer and chronic viral infections. The goal is to use this knowledge to improve vaccine design. An ERC Consolidation Grant will provide him with the funding…

Studying Sumerian grammar in your free time: Bram Jagersma did it. He described centuries-old Sumerian using a modern method he devised himself. For this PhD research he was awarded the De La Court Award for Independent Research by the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Science (KNAW).

2024 has been an eventful year, and this is reflected in our social media posts. An overview of the most liked, most shared or most impressive posts.

If you know a crime is about to occur, should you be able to prevent it before it has even happened? This was one of the questions that was posed in light of predictive policing as a form of mass surveillance during the debate in the elective Governance of Crime and Social Disorder class of the Crisis…

Sixth-grade students with lower mathematical ability perform better on complex arithmetic problems if they write down their calculations. This discovery was made by psychologist Marije Fagginger Auer, a specialist in Methodology and Statistics. Her outlook is optimistic: ‘After training, these students…

Programming is an excellent career option for blind children, and a way to have fun and express themselves. But the existing tools for programming are often not suitable for the blind and visually impaired. Leiden researchers will change that.

On Saturday 13 October the historical city Leiden was crowded with prospective students visiting the Open Day. They all came to Leiden to orientate themselves towards studying at Leiden University or to ask questions about the content of the bachelor’s programmes. Among them were a lot of international…

Besides being a linguist, George Saad is also a photography fanatic. He shares his most beautiful and telling pictures, shot during his field research in Eastern Indonesia.

How do I get into this hard-to-reach classroom with my wheelchair? How do I learn to divide my time better over the courses I’m taking? Can I take an exam on my laptop? These are all questions with which students have approached Jaap de Witte. For several years now, he has been a study adviser for students…

Scientists have developed a material that breaks one of the fundamental principles governing many physical systems. Ordinary materials transmit external forces equally, no matter where the pressure comes from. The newly developed material breaks this rule and could potentially be of interest in soft-robotics…

Antibiotic-resistant bacteria are a major problem worldwide. Molecular biologist Changsheng Wu explored innovative methods of developing new antibiotics more simply and more easily. He also discovered a new type of antibiotic.

Researchers at LIACS have found a vulnerability in open-source code that’s been used around the world for over 15 years. They’ve also developed an AI-based tool to fix the problem automatically. ‘You really can’t afford to lean back.’

The extension of the Dutch government’s Covid-19 relief measures for businesses has ensured that in the last six months of 2020 the number of bankruptcies was at an all-time low. However, according to the Bijzonder Beheer Barometer (special risk management barometer) an initiative of PwC and the Department…

From 11 to 17 September, Leiden will be all about art and science. What can the combination of these two domains do for us? And how can cooperation between them be strengthened? Several public events and a brand new symposium for specialists should answer these questions.

Researchers at Leiden University led by Mario van der Stelt (Leiden Institute for Chemistry) have set ‘gold standards’ for developing new painkillers based on the medicinal effects of cannabis. Publication in Nature Communications.

Late in 2015 a woman gave birth to a baby conceived following the reimplantation of thawed ovarian tissue. The woman was able to become pregnant thanks to transplantation of the tissue that took place in the LUMC.

In order to be able to handle the pressure of modern life better, Koreans practise GiCheon: intensive exercises for body and spirit. This movement theory is based on the tradition of mountain ascetics, but GiCheon is primarily a modern urban phenomenon. This is the conclusion of PhD candidate Victoria…

In line with tradition, the opening of the academic year will see the presentation of the LUS Teaching Prize to the University's best lecturer. Get to know the nominees. This week: Kim Beerden.

Erik Kwakkel, researcher at the Faculty of Humanities, has found an extraordinary manuscript in the University Library’s extensive collection of medieval books. The book in question dates back to the first half of the eleventh century and is made entirely out of waste left over from the production of…

On September 1 2017, Marlou Grobben ends her term as assessor of the faculty board of the Faculty of Governance and Global Affairs. After a two- year period, having represented the student- interests within the faculty board, the position is transferred to Esmee Braam.

What is it like to be a Leiden University student at Campus The Hague? These prospective students found out on the Experience Day of 30 March.

An online ceremony, no party and then no signature in the Sweat Room: during the pandemic, many graduation traditions could not take place. Now anyone who graduated in corona time may still come and sign their name.

We often assume that highly gifted children always perform at maximum capacity. Psychologist Bart Vogelaar discovered that this group too benefits from training and explanation. Strangely enough, the benefits are the same for both groups. PhD defence 18 January.

In order to stop a whole range of diseases or disorders at their source, you would have to be able to switch certain genes on or off. Sebastian Pomplun wants to develop substances that can do this very precisely. For example, he wants to disrupt cancer processes and make cells produce an important missing…

Neighbourhood newspapers, newsletters and Facebook groups: Leiden residents have dozens of ways to keep each other informed about news in their neighbourhood. Students from the pre-master's programme in Journalism and New Media mapped out all these different media and asked themselves: what is the future…

A patent for what may be a potent, new antibiotic. And: a clear overview of promising approaches to overcome a crucial resistance tactic employed by bacteria. In the span of one week, two researchers from Leiden are receiving their PhDs, each of them on an important step in the battle against bacteria…

The underwater world around present-day Indonesia has changed greatly in recent centuries as a result of human activity. University lecturer Johannes Müller has been awarded an NWO XS grant to map the history of the Indonesian ecosystems.

Words originally intended to indicate space, such as ‘out’, are also regularly used to indicate cause and effect. Why does this happen? And how does it work in other languages? PhD candidate Camil Staps decided to find out.

The Greek alphabet dates back to the eighth century BC. At least, that is what science assumed for a long time. Associate Professor Willemijn Waal is going to use a Vici grant to investigate whether the Greek alphabet may be centuries older, and was initially written only on perishable materials.

On 22 August was the start of the HOPweek, the introduction week for first year students studying at Campus The Hague of Leiden University. First year students were assigned to their own group with their own mentors. During this week the students could do fun activities and workshops where they got…

Thirteen Leiden University exchange projects have been awarded an Erasmus+ International Credit Mobility grant. The total award of around 450,000 euros will enable 103 students and staff to go on an exchange.

Bodies come in all different shapes and sizes. For his PhD, Andries Hiskes researched the disabled body and the reactions it can bring.

The first Online Career Week took place last week, from 11 to 15 May. Instead of the Campus The Hague and Humanities Career Event, the Career Services of 3 faculties organised this alternative. Almost 400 students signed up!

In a well-filled Telders Auditorium, university learners of Korean competed with each other to see who speaks Korean the best.

On 24 February school pupils came looking for their dream programme in a packed Pieterskerk. Did they find what they were looking for? And does an Open Day help?

Three years after the very first cohort of the Leiden University Bachelor of International Studies graduated, approximately 40 alumni and staff got together for a day of recollecting pleasant memories and sharing new stories. The BAIS Alumni Board collected some ‘Lessons learned’ from their alumni.