In the summer of 2015 the former Finnish foreign minister Erkki Tuomioja, together with a group of Finnish historians, took an important initiative and established the organization Historians Without Borders (HWB).

Every year, the dissertation prize is awarded to the best dissertation of the past year by the Association for Educational Research (VOR). Marjon Baas (ICLON researcher) is one of the nominees. She talks about her dissertation.

'Academics who share their knowledge with the outside world on social media are often insulted or even threatened. Especially female academics and academics of colour seem to regularly be the victim of sexist and racist comments.' This is what Ineke Sluiter, Professor of Greek Language and Literature…

The Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences has elected five Leiden professors from different disciplines as new members. Two of the new members are women.

Thousands of first-year students and hundreds of mentors kicked off the EL CID on Monday morning. This year for the first time, the introduction week of Leiden University and Leiden University of Applied Sciences was also open for students of Regional Training Centre mboRijnland and the Leiden Instrument…

Professor of Sociohistorical Linguistics Ingrid Tieken-Boon van Ostade was appointed Knight in the Order of the Lion of the Netherlands on 11 September in her home city of The Hague. Deputy Mayor Bert van Alphen presented her with the decoration.

On 15 January, the winner of the famed LION Image Award will be announced. Submissions ranged from the famous 3d printed microboat to an eerily abstract graph depicting a Majorana fermion.

The Queens of the Nile exhibition at the National Museum of Antiquities finally affords the wives of the pharoahs the attention they deserve. Thanks to guest curator Olaf Kaper, students and PhD candidates gained valuable experience in museum curating.

‘A challenging rollercoaster, but also a very bonding and insightful experience,’ that’s how the team of iGEM Leiden 2022 wraps up their participation in the iGEM contest. The contest for synthetic biology climaxed during the Grand Jamboree in Paris. The team ended up in the top 10 of over 360 teams…

The Tour of Asia, an afternoon filled with science and culture about Asia, attracted many visitors. In spite of the heavy rain, the visitors chose from among dozens of lectures and debates. This knowledge festival marked the opening of the Asian Library earlier in the day.

On 8 September the students of the European Law Master gathered in the Lorentzzaal for the festive opening of their programme.

Researchers at LUMC are trying to decipher the biological clock. This knowledge can help deal with luxury problems, such as jetlag, but can also counter diseases. Molecular neurobiologist Erno Vreugdenhil explains.

On 21 March 2024, the ‘learners’ at Wolfert Bilingual in Rotterdam were not teenagers, but some 180 teachers and teacher educators from around the Netherlands and beyond. Those delegates were bound by a common interest in exploring and engaging with teaching and learning in linguistically and culturally…

The Leiden Hortus botanicus has received an inheritance of 5 million euros. This is a gift from the estate of Carla van Steijn, who was a loyal visitor to the Hortus during her lifetime. In accordance with her wishes, the gift will be used for new activities and to optimise accessibility for less-able-bodied…

All comets might share their place of birth, new research says. For the first time ever, astronomer Christian Eistrup applied chemical models to fourteen well-known comets, surprisingly finding a clear pattern. His publication has been accepted in the journal Astronomy & Astrophysics.

This summer, Leiden, The Hague, Noordwijk and Delft will be hosting the ‘Sizzling Summer of Space’. To tie in with the international Space Studies Programme, all kinds of activities on space exploration are being organised, from a film evening to a Science Café and an exhibition of satellites to the…

Building a fire involves many variables, such as size, choice of fuel, temperature, and burn time, that affect the way the generated heat can be used, and therefore the potential function of a fire. A group of Leiden archaeologists are, together with a team of international colleagues, investigating…

Leiden University has published its annual report for 2019. The report is a testament to everyone’s hard work and creativity and shows just how much we have achieved together: students, lecturers, researchers, support staff, administrators and supervisors alike.

Laura Boncz was a member of the faculty board last year as an assessor of the Faculty of Social Sciences. Robin Buijs will take over from September. In this article Laura looks back and you can meet Robin.

Graphene, the ultra-thin wonder material just a single carbon atom in thickness, holds the promise of such impressive applications as wear-resistant, friction-free coatings. But first manufacturers have to be able to produce large sheets of graphene under precisely controlled conditions. Dirk van Baarle…

Welcome to the 2024-2025 academic year! I hope this finds you feeling refreshed following an enjoyable and restful summer holiday season. As we start the autumn semester, I want to look back briefly by highlighting 10 significant milestones at LUCSoR from this past year (some of which I referenced in…

What is the current situation of human rights in relation to detention under criminal law and immigration law, now that more and more parties are becoming involved in the administration of detention and crimmigration is on the rise? PhD defence on 21 January 2020.

How is Young Star Renske Donkers doing now? Early this year she was the second person ever to win the Young Star Award for the best bachelor student. After her bachelor Molecular Science & Technology, Renske is now busy with her master Chemical Process Engineering in Delft. ‘This award was a great boost…

Diplomatica addresses the broad range of work being done across the social sciences and the humanities that takes diplomacy as its focus of investigation. The journal explores and investigates diplomacy as an extension of social interests, forces, and environments.

Three new initiatives will provide a more diverse view of Leiden’s academic history, literally and figuratively: a historical study on the background of students and scientists, a new book about the Academy Building, and two new sculptures of female scientists, Ewine van Dishoek, Professor of Molecular…

What is the best way to restore dune ecosystems? The project TERRA-Dunes researches the role of soil microbes in the development of natural dune areas. Recently, the project went into a new phase: planting 412 oak seedlings grown in different type of soils.

A team of five PhD students from Leiden University is in the running for first prize in the Pharmacometrics Skills Competition. In a drug development simulation, they apply their mathematical pharmacological skills to solve clinical problems. On 24 March they will compete in the finals in Orlando, F…

It's easy to forget in these turbulent times, but on March 9th the film 'Humans of Humanities' premiered in cinema Trianon in Leiden. 160 guests saw Leiden scientists, teachers, students and alumni talk on the big screen about the value of their work as a humanities scholar. The film was followed by…

Extremely painful chronic cluster headaches – sometimes referred to as ‘suicide headaches’ – can be prevented by stimulating the occipital nerve in the back of the head, according to research conducted by Professor Emeritus of Neurology Michel Ferrari from Leiden University Medical Center (LUMC). The…

The West has missed several opportunities to prevent the invasion of Ukraine or, at the very least, to better support the Ukraine, claims Frans Osinga, Professor by special appointment War Studies.

The behaviour of strongly correlated electron systems, such as high-temperature superconductors, defies explanation in the language of ordinary quantum theory. A seemingly unrelated area of physics, string theory, might give physicists a better understanding of the weird behaviour of these kinds of…

On June 14th, Jeroen Duindam, Professor of History at the Faculty of Humanities, was awarded an exceptionally high distinction for his achievements in the field of Austrian history.

What do we need to do for Leiden University to become a truly inclusive institution, where everyone feels at home and has equal opportunities? This is the key question at the annual symposium on diversity and inclusiveness on 1 December. If you would like to put your views, sign up now!

An international group of scientists, led by Leiden physicist Sense Jan van der Molen, has developed the first switchable molecular diode. You can turn this on and off through humidity. Vice versa, it is a humidity sensor at the nanoscale. Publication on 4 December in Nature Nanotechnology.

Glorious sunshine, dozens of enthusiastic academics and huge numbers of Leiden residents ensured that this year’s special jubilee version of 3 October University was a great success.

High-temperature superconductivity is one of the big mysteries in physics. Milan Allan’s research group used a Josephson Scanning Tunneling Microscope to image spatial variations of superconducting particles for the first time, and published about it in the journal Nature.

Two statues of gorillas abducting women: they were what led PhD candidate Dick van Broekhuizen to write a new type of history of nineteenth-century sculpture. ‘If you view nineteenth-century art history from a less narrow perspective, the narrative changes completely.’ PhD ceremony on 21 June.

‘The whole of society benefits if it is accessible for people with a disability.' This is what Pauline Gransier, student of Film and Literary Studies at Leiden University, has to say. She has been nominated for the Top 100 Enabled.

Gerard Soeteman (1936) created a furore as a screenwriter of films that became classics (Dutch films: Turks Fruit, Soldaat van Oranje, de Aanslag), but personally he is much more attached to his critical documentaries for television. He studied Dutch in Leiden. How did that help him?

FactRank is a new online tool that automatically detects ‘checkable’ claims made by politicians in parliamentary debates or tweets, and therefore enables fact-checkers to work much faster. Alexander Pleijter, a researcher and lecturer in Journalism and New Media, helped develop FactRank.

The Hague Program on International Cyber Security focuses on the various modes of governance that states and other actors can bring into play to deal with and shape the strategic challenges in the digital environment. This years conference focused on international cyber security and the role of the…

On Friday 10 December 2021, the Center for Law and Digital Technologies (eLaw) of the Leiden Law School, hosted its annual Research Colloquium exploring the theme 'Law Gone Digital'. The event gathered presentations by eLaw PhD candidates and professors on a wide range of topics at the interface of…

For the next five years, thanks to a highly competitive European grant, Nadine Akkerman will be able to focus on voices from the past that might otherwise never have been heard. This is because in the 16th and 17th centuries what we now call a ghostwriter already existed. As Akkerman explains, ‘a lot…

South Korean smash hit Squid Game is on track to becoming the most successful Netflix production ever. The series is number one in over 90 countries. Professor and Korea expert Remco Breuker can see why South Korean pop culture is becoming so popular, also outside Asia.

Every year around 3,900 master's students sign their name in Leiden's famous 'Sweat Room' when they graduate. What do they do after that? Five young alumni talk about their work.

'It gave our team a big boost to hear that our work was valuable,' says medical chemist Elmer Maurits about the moment they won the Venture Challenge. With their company Iprotics, they want to develop a drug that can better treat patients with autoimmune diseases and blood cancers. 25,000 euros of prize…

The enthusiastic finalists of the Sustainable Business Battle proved that sustainability and business can go together well. Fire in their bellies, they pitched their green solutions, ranging from an Energy Race app for DUWO to a cycle parking facility covered with plants at the Bio Science Park.

Lecture, Seminar and book discussion