Shell, our country's largest company, is constructing a vast plastics plant in the United States. And it is doing so at a time when the European Union, led by the Netherlands, is launching a major pact to combat use of plastic.

Kohei Suzuki, Assistant Professor at Institute of Public Administration, and two other authors researched the topic of innovation by governments in response to expected population decline.

To generate electricity, power plants use huge amounts of water. In Europe and the United States, generating electricity is accountable for 40% of the total water withdrawal. PhD candidate Industrial Ecology Yi Jin devoted his research to the water footprint of power plants and the impact on the environment.…

The different kinds of cultural perspectives on health and disease of the participants are related to their knowledge, beliefs, values and practices manifested in various forms of lifestyle in Indonesia. The cultural diversity of the population is also related to differences in health behaviour.

Recently graduated Biology student Julia López Delgado is one of the winners of the Holland Society Young Talent Awards 2019. She received her prize during the festive award ceremony on 25 November in Haarlem.

Koper

There is concern about the threat that nanoplastics (NPs) may pose to both wildlife and humans. This thesis explores the mechanisms of toxicity of polystyrene nanoparticles (PS-NPs) in chicken embryo.

Promotor: Prof.dr. G.R. de Snoo, Co-promotor: R. Heijungs

PhD student Thierry Rohmer received the Ernst Award 2009 of the Gesellschaft Deutscher Chemiker (GDCh) for his publication in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Science of the USA on the structure-function relation of the photoreceptor phytochrome. The prize was presented at the Annual Discussion…

A new way to decipher the light from distant worlds could give us unmistakable evidence of extraterrestrial photosynthesis, and maybe alien plants, finds astronomy author Colin Stuart in the New Scientist. In his article, he describes the work of the group led by Leiden astronomer Rob van Holstein.…

Lecture, CHiLL series

Promotor: J.M. Memelink

This article provides a list of the concepts and key elements that should be considered when creating effective communication messages.

In this research project characteristics of effective instructional development were identified that are appealing to medical teachers and relevant for medical education.

Can we use indigenous microbial rice communities to reduce methane production in agricultural settings?

Homicide followed by the suicide of the perpetrator often leads to shock and incomprehension. It has been suggested that media reporting on such cases could lead to an imitation effect.

This thesis describes the role of pollution, specifically neonicotinoid insecticides, as an actor of the ongoing biodiversity decline.

In this article, Martin Sievert and Jonas Bruder investigated whether and how administrative burdens influences citizens' perceptions of welfare policies and attitudes towards beneficiaries.

In this article, Eamon Aloyo argues that university supervisors should not use student evaluations of teachers as a measure of teaching effectiveness.

What are the biological effects of Chinese herbal medicine in regulation of cancer cell metastasis?

Can we distinguish the effects of pesticides from other abiotic and biotic factors that occur in the field? And how do these factors interact with pesticides?

1. To what extent do metallic NPs added to soil extractions change the activity, abundance, or community composition of microbes? 2. How do the effects of metallic NPs on soil microbes differ from the effects of the ions shedding from corresponding NPs?

Engineered nanomaterials (ENMs) are widely used, and nanotechnological innovations grow with rapid pace. Studies on nanotoxicology have demonstrated that chemical toxicology as well as particle toxicology should be accounted for in predicting the safety of ENMs.

For the first time in the Netherlands, an exotic insect species is released into the wild to combat a harmful plant species. The Japanese knotweed psyllid should offer relief against the rampant Asian knotweed. Suzanne Lommen of the Institute of Biology Leiden coordinates the field trials.

Online data breaches are recurrent and damaging cyber incidents fors organizations worldwide. This study examines how organizations can effectively mitigate reputational damages in the aftermath of data breaches by hacking, through situational crisis communication strategies.

Jaroslaw Kantorowicz and Rok Spruk examine the contribution of institutional reforms to economic growth.

On 24 November 2015, Prof. Carsten Stahn participated as external expert in a special plenary session of the Assembly of States Parties on the efficiency and effectiveness of Court proceedings, chaired by the co-chairs of the Study Group on Governance of the Assembly.

Promotor: Carel J. ten Cate, Co-Promotor: Hans W. Slabbekoorn

Does an Emotional Working Memory Training show a beneficial transfer effect on emotion regulation (reappraisal) capacities in patients with Borderline Personality Disorder?

Anthropogenic noise has been shown to affect marine animals in various ways, this may have fitness consequences at individual and population level. This thesis aims to increase insight into the quantification of sound-induced behavioural responses that are relevant to fitness, and into factors that…

Valérie Pattyn, Assistant Professor at Leiden University, researched

Remko Offringa has been appointed Professor in the field of Plant Developmental Genetics within the Faculty of Science at the Institute of Biology Leiden (IBL) from the 1st of April 2017. Offringa’s research focuses on the role of the plant hormone auxin in controlling plant growth and development,…

Through various initiatives, Leiden University is trying to make people aware of the importance of biodiversity: the cultivation of a wide variety of micro-organisms, animals and plant species. This is important because in the Netherlands biodiversity has declined from about 40 percent in 1900 to about…

Plants not only sense when they are touched, but they can also adapt to it. For example, by strengthening or defending themselves. But how do plants do this? The Green TE (Green Tissue Engineering) consortium has been granted a Gravitation grant of almost 23 million euros to investigate exactly this…

How to make a quantitative assessment of the relative contribution to toxicity of ions and particles? Is the toxicity of nanoparticles related to their size or shape? Which physicochemical property of nanoparticles is an appropriate dose metric of nanoparticles?

The lipid matrix in the stratum corneum (SC), the upper layer of the skin, plays a critical role in the skin barrier. The matrix consists of ceramides (CERs), cholesterol (CHOL) and free fatty acids (FFAs).

Which intervention technique is more effective in reducing public speaking anxiety in children aged 9 – 12 years, exposure or restructuring cognitions?

Tin electrodeposition applications have rapidly evolved in the past 25 years.

Anthropogenic noise negatively affects wildlife in a wide range of taxonomic groups.

In this article, Amandine Lerusse, investigates how the order of performance information affects local politicians’ issue prioritisation decisions.

The strange tropical plants belonging to the Corsiaceae family first emerged millions of years ago on the supercontinent of Gondwana. That is what Leiden University researcher Constantijn Mennes concludes in an article in the Journal of Biogeography.

This article describes the creation of an app that can help raise climate awareness and the action globally.

Leiden and Austrian researchers have succeeded in further uncovering how a plant cell passes on the growth hormone auxin in a directional manner to the next cell. Three proteins that cling together in a bunch appear to be essential for this important transport process. ‘This discovery solves a crucial…

National Meat Free Week (Nationale Week Zonder Vlees, 7–13 March) is an initiative to reduce meat consumption. Assistant professor Paul Behrens is studying what impact a change in our food consumption would have on the world. What, according to him, are the main reasons to switch to a (mainly) plant-based…

Freshwater and brackish water ecosystems are arguably the most vulnerable ecosystems on earth, due to concentrated human developments in and around them. The Pontocaspian (PC) region located at the border of Europe and Asia contains a variety of brackish water ecosystems and unique inhabitants, known…

In 2005, the LEAD Programme organised and coordinated the International Exhibition on ‘Jamu: Medicinal Plants for Health and Conservation in Indonesia’ in collaboration with Universitas Padjadjaran (UNPAD) in Bandung, Indonesia, the Mediterranean Agronomic Institute of Chania (MAICH) in Chania, Crete,…

Demonstration experiments are a potentially powerful instrument to improve the micro-macro thinking of students in secondary education. Therefore we want to design a practical and generative approach to assist teachers to develop lessons with a demonstration experiment.