During a symposium in honour of his 60th birthday, statistician Aad van der Vaart received the royal award of Knight in the Order of the Lion of the Netherlands. Colleagues talk about his significance for their field and how they got to know him. ‘The collaborations with Aad have been one of the great…

More than three quarters of the 237 million Indonesian population has no access to tap water. They are dependent on water from rivers often polluted by industry. Laure d’Hondt conducted research into why it is so difficult to tackle these polluters and will defend her PhD dissertation on 17 October.

The freedom to be who you are – woman, man, homosexual, heterosexual, transgender, religious, atheist, and so on – is perhaps the Netherlands’ greatest attribute. The principle of equality and the right not to be discriminated against are in the very first article of our constitution. Yet there is a…

Professor of Health Psychology Andrea Evers is one of the coordinators of the national Health and Wellbeing programme and of the Leiden-Delft-Erasmus (LDE) programme that goes by the same name. The aim is to use technology to promote our health. LDE has already been working on this topic for some ti…

Almost three years after receiving her honorary doctorate, Dr Graça Machel returned to Leiden University. Over the course of two days she spoke with students, researchers, and other interested persons, about human rights – particularly those of women and children – in a world in which these are continually…

How can you ensure that more experimental drugs reach the finish line? At the moment, only one in twenty cancer drugs that are tested on humans makes it to the market. This is an enormous loss for patients and society. With a grant from the National Growth Fund, Oncode-PACT aims to efficiently select…

Faced with warfare on the European continent and growing Sino-American geopolitical disputes, the EU’s rising use of sanctions and attention to economic security call for a better diplomatic understanding of how state-market actor-networks are assets of modern foreign and security policy.

As schools in the U.S., students have to enter through security gates; schools in Belgium were forced to remain closed for several days after the attacks there; and even in the Netherlands various bomb scares have led to children having to stay at home. And yet fear of terrorism remains a difficult…

Op dinsdag 10 januari 2022 zijn tijdens de facultaire nieuwjaarsreceptie de jaarlijkse Meijersprijzen en de scriptieprijzen uitgereikt.

Russia’s premeditated attack on Ukraine in February 2022 changed not only the security landscape of Europe. It also altered – at least for now – the structures of leadership and influence within the West.

In Belgium, officially recognised religions receive financial support from the state. Partly as a result, there is no clearly implemented secularism (separation of church and state) though this is considered to be a guiding notion in modern constitutional theories. PhD candidate Alain Vannieuwenburg…

The Netherlands Organisation for Scientific Research (NWO) has awarded Veni funding to seventeen researchers who recently obtained their PhD. This award offers promising young scientists the opportunity to develop their own ideas over a period of three years.

There is a crisis in the law concerning the accommodation of religious practice. The legal profession is demanding that the law be changed because it does not want religious institutions to have the 'right to discriminate'. The profession holds that evolving societal sexual norms can render lawful religious…

A new year that will bring all sorts of developments in the world of research. What are the new year’s resolutions in social sciences research at our faculty? What unites us, and what exciting developments do we anticipate?

How do bacteria sense and adapt to their environment? Ariane Briegel, Professor of Ultrastructural Biology, is intrigued by this question. Using new techniques, she produces three-dimensional images of bacteria that provide us with new clues about their sensory system.

Online competitions, online sports, dietary advice for staff and students and 'What do they eat for lunch?' The first 'volunteer' is Vice-Rector Hester Bijl. What does her lunch usually consist of? The University Sports Centre is celebrating its fifty-year anniversary with a whole - corona-proof - programme…

On Thursday 25 and Friday 26 October 2018, the Europa Institute organized a conference within the framework of ‘Interaction between Legal Systems (ILS): Policing the High Seas’ and in cooperation with four Interest Groups of the European Society of International Law. The event brought together representatives…

University lecturer Peter Burger has been researching the reliability of stories for almost 30 years. Whether political news item or urban myth, he debunks falsehoods and half-truths on an almost daily basis. He recently received a prize for his complete oeuvre.

Psychologists Fenna Poletiek and Erik de Kwaadsteniet have received a grant from the FNV trade union to research people’s attitude to work if they receive a basic income. How do they plan to find answers?

'Continuing to work on my professional development is inspiring and stimulating, and it’s rewarding to have an influence on how psychology is taught.’ This is how Margot van der Doef describes the track that brought her the Senior Teaching Qualification (SKO). ‘And you can easily do it in parallel with…

Data science and statistics are closely linked, says Spinoza laureate and Stochastics professor Aad van der Vaart. We talk with him about the big data hype, genome research and collaboration with other disciplines. ‘Statistics helps wherever data is not perfect.’

Big celebration upcoming weekend: MIRD's 20th anniversary is on the cards. Four alumni from different periods tell what this unique two-year master's in International Relations and Diplomacy has brought them.

The first Scaliger Medal was presented on 19 September to Leuven Professor Kurt Deketelaere, President of the League of European Research Universities (LERU). He received the award in recognition of his tireless commitment to promoting European research.

At least six people are off to a good start of the summer, because they are the recipients of a Meijers grant. For the next few years, these researchers will be able to devote themselves to their PhD research. Let’s meet these new PhD candidates!

Authors: Michèle Bos and Jan Melissen

Each year, the Netherlands Institute of Governance (NIG) invites PhD students from Public Administration departments at universities in the Netherlands and Flanders to nominate their supervisor(s) for the NIG Supervisor of the Year Award, to celebrate and recognize excellent PhD supervision. This year,…

No fewer than seven Leiden FWN students received a Young Talent Award from the Royal Dutch Academy of Sciences on Monday, 29 November. Mark van den Bosch and Karlijn Kruiswijk won a graduation prize, a group of young astronomers won the ET Outreach Award and the other five students each received an…

Hanneke Hulst has held the new Leiden chair in Neuropsychology in Health and Disease since 1 September. From 1 January she will also be chair of the Health, Medical and Neuropsychology (HMN) unit. ‘HMN is my new base. I’m curious to find out about the people who work here, what they do and what motivates…

Alumna Jolien Schukking has been working as a judge at the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg since 2017. In this special role, she provides legal protection at an international level in major cases and concerning various topics. What is her job like and what motivates her?

In the past months the COVID-19 pandemic has made the world become more reliant on digital communication and social media. As virtual spectators of diplomacy during these times, it is not difficult to notice that diplomacy is more colourful nowadays.

This year, eleven exchange projects from Leiden University received an Erasmus+ International Credit Mobility education grant. The total award of almost €510.000 enables 98 students and staff members to go on exchange.

Conference, Research Seminar

The widespread idea that politics is mediatised needs to be revised. Although media attention heavily influences some political processes, this is not the case when it comes to lawmaking. Lotte Melenhorst, a political scientist at Leiden University, analysed three heavily covered legislative processes…

Sarah Cramsey was appointed professor by special appointment of Central European Studies at the Institute of History on 14 September. 'I am keen to incorporate different scholarly approaches into my work and raise the profile of Central European Studies in Leiden.'

Lecture, Book Launch

Japanese was not always the language spoken in Japan. Researchers link the arrival of the language in Japan with the migration of farmers around 400 BC. Linguist Elisabeth de Boer has been awarded an ERC Starting Grant to carry out research on the further spread of the language in Japan.

Dr Nathalie Brusgaard both studied and finished her PhD at the Faculty of Archaeology in Leiden. After a few years spreading her wings, she is now back. As the new Assistant Professor in the World Archaeology department, she will continue her research on the relationship between prehistoric humans and…

In recent years, the public discourse on immigration in Europe and in the United States has often focused on efforts to increase security and restrict traffic on external borders. How old is this phenomenon of states attempting to control migrations on external borders? What were the motives and the…

Prior to arriving to Leiden, Dr. Abazon completed her Ph.D. at Yale University's Department of Comparative Literature, where she also taught courses ranging from Introduction to Zionism to World Cinema.

What inspires scholars who study the history, cultures, religions and languages of the Middle East, North Africa and Central Asia? LUCIS interviewed scholars about their work and research in the video project “Passion in Profession”. The videos are available online now.

PhD defence

Lecture

PhD defence

Lecture, colloquium

PhD defence

Lecture

PhD defence

Lecture

Lecture, China Seminar Series event