On March 16th, students from all over the world visited Leiden's Humanities Faculty to explore their options during the Master's Open Day. 'Leiden is a beautiful city, I feel like I could definitely study here.'

How can I teach children programming in a playful way? That's the question Felienne Hermans asked herself when she gave programming lessons to children on Saturdays. In March 2020 she launched the Hedy programming language, and with success: 100,000 programs have already been made with Hedy worldwid…

Nieuwscheckers, a team of journalist fact-checkers from Leiden University, received the Mr. K.J. Cath Prize at the opening of the academic year on 5 September. This biennial prize is awarded to students or staff who have enhanced the University’s good name.

Professor of Sociology of Law Maartje van der Woude (Van Vollenhoven Instituut, Metajuridica) has been appointed as visiting professor at the Department of Criminology & Sociology of Law Department of Criminology at the University of Oslo in Norway. The appointment will have a duration of three year…

Which Italian student likes raw herring, but does not know Sinterklaas? During the Leiden Science Buddy Welcome Borrel, international students and their buddies found out over drinks and while playing a special bingo game.

Male scientists owe their position to their brilliance, women to their hard work. Or do they? The Equalista app helps staff and students at the Faculty of Humanities to become aware of gender equality.

Leiden physicist Milan Allan and his group have discovered an apparent paradox within a material that has zero electrical resistance. They measured trapped charges, while charges should in theory keep flowing in the absence of resistance. The discovery could provide a missing piece of one of the big…

Stress and overwork are massive problems today, but relatively little is known about stress factors in the past. With a look at the deep history of stress, Sarah Schrader hopes to get a better understanding of the human stress experience. Her project application received an NWO XS grant.

Leiden University has taken 18th place in the SustainaBul, the sustainability ranking of universities and universities of applied sciences in the Netherlands. A total of 32 institutions took part in this the tenth edition of SustainaBul. Although Leiden University is two places higher than last year,…

Edited by Michael Kowalski

Leiden biotech company In Ovo, a spin-off of Leiden University, has received a European Innovation Council Accelerator Pilot Grant. In Ovo will use this 2.5-million-euro grant in its mission to stop the culling of male chicks.

Danique Reidsma, student Economics, Policy and Management (EBM) at Leiden University, recently gave a presentation at a symposium of the Dutch Association of Social Security (NGSZ) in The Hague. She presented her own research around the question of whether eHealth can help to keep health care expenditure…

The Duurzame Jonge 100 (Sustainable Young 100) is an annual election for young entrepreneurs, young professionals and students who show that a sustainable future is possible. The 100 most inspiring people in the field of sustainability are chosen from all participants and appear on the list. This year,…

A course that concludes with a video pitch, instead of a paper or examination: Italian Language and Culture students each recorded their own knowledge clip, speaking to a wide audience about Italian cultural expressions. We asked Goran Bouaziz, Cameron-May Bosch and Katja Timmer what they thought of…

Professor Maartje van der Woude, Professor of Law & Society at the Van Vollenhoven Institute, has been appointed as one of the three new series editors for the Routledge Studies in Criminal Justice, Borders and Citizenship.

The European Commission awarded the project proposal INSIGHT, a follow-up project on illegal firearms trafficking and gun violence from Professor Social Resilience and Security Marieke Liem and PhD-researcher Katharina Krüsselmann of the Institute of Security and Global Affairs (ISGA).

From 29 to 30 October 2024, the Kalshoven-Gieskes Forum (KGF) and the Grotius Centre for International Legal Studies had the pleasure of hosting an inspiring authors’ workshop in The Hague for the forthcoming Research Handbook, Victims' Rights under Public International Law, edited by Dr Robert Heinsch…

As of 1 September, Jeroen van Zon started as professor by special appointment in Quantitative Developmental Biology at the Institute of Biology Leiden (IBL). Van Zon is also group leader of Quantitative Developmental Biology at the physics research institute AMOLF. Three questions about his new role…

Two research projects with researchers from Leiden University have been awarded a Dutch Research Council (NWO) Open Competition Domain Science-M programme grant. These grants fund curiosity-driven, fundamental research in the Science domain.

On the occasion of the Workshop organized last July to officially launch the Leiden Chinese Queer Collection (LCQC), the National Museum of Taiwan Literature (NMTL) donated 30 titles of Taiwanese LGBTQ+ literature to support this initiative. These works where published between 1971 and 2022 by authors…

The Dutch temporary bridging measure for self-employed professionals (known as Tozo) was set up to help Dutch self-employed professionals who are experiencing financial difficulties due to the Covid-19 pandemic. Last week, the ombudsman announced an investigation into the scheme for the self-employed.…

Assistant Professor Mike Schmidli has won the 2025 Faculty Teaching Prize. The Education Committee praised his commitment not only to teaching students well, but also to helping them develop into well-rounded individuals.

LUC students and staff came together this past semester to transform a local urban garden into a hands-on space for learning, experimentation, and community building.

Two Leiden projects have been awarded Open Science NL funding to make science more accessible to academia and the world outside. The projects will strengthen the open science infrastructure.

Luca Bruls has received a Catharina Halkes Fonds fellowship grant to finalize her fieldwork in Chad and Senegal and to complete her first ethnographic film.

Associate Professor Carolien Stolte has been appointed visiting professor at the Royal Netherlands Institute in Rome (KNIR). Stolte will continue her research into global peace movements there during the coming semester.

Nederland presenteert zich internationaal als voorvechter van het recht, maar in de praktijk blijkt dat standpunt vaak afhankelijk van geopolitieke belangen. Drie experts in internationaal recht , Anna Marhold, Joris Larik en Nico Schrijver, duiden in het NRC de spanning tussen principes en politieke…

Nederland presenteert zich internationaal als voorvechter van het recht, maar in de praktijk blijkt dat standpunt vaak afhankelijk van geopolitieke belangen. Drie experts in internationaal recht , Anna Marhold, Joris Larik en Nico Schrijver, duiden in het NRC de spanning tussen principes en politieke…

The Leiden Faculty of Science has appointed three new professors. Daniel Rozen, Frank Takes and Matthijs van Leeuwen were appointed on 1 April.

A group of Leiden students launched the Van Leiden tot Later (From Leiden to Later) media platform on 27 March. In podcasts and videos, they talk with high-profile alumni about the big issues of today. ‘We want to build a bridge between generations.’

On 19 March 2026, Verena Weimer successfully defended her PhD thesis at Leiden University, titled 'Operationalisation of Higher Education Teaching Performance (HETP): recognising and rewarding teaching as a part of science is enabled by Open Scholarship'.

Launch your own start-up!

Alicia Schrikker, Director of Research at the Leiden University Institute for History shed light on the importance of preserving archives of natural disasters. Her lecture titled History, Memory, and Archives of Disaster looked at the 1883 Krakatoa eruption through archival records of the colonial government…

Op zaterdag 3 juni vindt de Museumnacht Leiden plaats. Ook dit jaar zijn Leidse wetenschappers en studenten onderdeel van de programmering.

Arnold Tukker has been appointed as distinguished visiting professor at Nanjing University in the field of industrial ecology.

Researcher Yung Lin received the Young Scholar Award at the annual conference of the European Association for Taiwan Studies (EATS). She obtained her PhD in 2025 on Taiwan’s public diplomacy.

From idea to tangible ‘pretotype’: during two new workshops, psychology students brought their innovative concepts to life. Using simple materials and plenty of creativity, they presented solutions at the intersection of neuropsychology and entrepreneurship.

On April 13, 84 students from 4th and 5th year pre-university education participated in the Bachelor Trial Study Day. They attended two trial lectures and asked questions to a student panel to get an idea of ​​the study programme and career opportunities.

Ben Van Rompuy, associate professor of European Competiton Law, appeared on 15 April as an expert before the European Parliament's Committee on the Internal Market and Consumer Protection and also authored a briefing paper with recommendations to effectively address Territorial Supply Constraints…

Volgens hoogleraar internationaal recht, Larissa van den Herik, is het geen naïviteit om in internationaal recht te geloven. Het alternatief is volgens haar een wereld waarin rauwe macht overheerst en veiligheid verdwijnt, zegt zij in het NRC.

Visual ethnography has become an integral part of anthropology in Leiden. The students from the master’s specialisation will present their work at the LUVE festival on 8, 9 and 10 October. ‘For a film you have to negotiate with your research participants.’

Erwin Muller, Dean of FGGA and Administrator of Campus The Hague, and Koen Caminada, Vice-Dean, share their thoughts on how ‘we’ as a faculty are doing based on three themes. A discussion about the balancing act between what is and what isn’t possible and the natural urge to continue to grow, the utility…

For the first time, a group of international and interdisciplinary researchers led by Karline Janmaat and her former MSc Student Chirag Chittar, have tested the several hypotheses on music simultaneously in a modern foraging society during their daily search for tubers – their staple food.

It doesn’t take long before Tim van Lit has told us what interests him: problems that shake the nation. This 28-year-old Criminology alumnus heads a team of 25 at Royal Netherlands Marechaussee. Location: Schiphol Airport.

The brightness peak of the ring around M87's supermassive black hole has shifted 30 degrees counterclockwise in a year. This is shown by new images released by the Event Horizon Telescope consortium.

Many students and members of staff at Leiden University are politically active. In the run up to the local elections on 21 March candidates in The Hague and Leiden explain why you should vote for them, and what they want to do if they are elected. In this article, the Leiden candidates.

Better supervision of PhD candidates, clear guidelines on career paths and an MRI scanner that can be accessed by all researchers: these are the recommendations from the new self-evaluation. Colleagues say: ‘This forces us as an institute to formulate our mission and vision more precisely.’

Annetje Ottow is the first female president of the Executive Board of Leiden University, which means a return to her Alma mater.

During the New Year's Reception at FSW, new Dean Sarah de Rijcke gave her maiden speech. The first official moment at which she's able to share what she stands for and what to expect of her. In case you weren't there, or you want to read the speech at your own pace, below you can find the integral copy…

In prehistoric times there was a huge wave of migration, from the steppes in Russia and Ukraine to West Europe. The newcomers’ genes began to dominate. Archaeology research in Leiden into burial mounds in the Veluwe and Utrechtse Heuvelrug areas of the Netherlands yielded this spectacular conclusion.…