In the context of the 2021 Day of General Discussion of the UN Committee on Rights of the Child, this time dedicated to alternative care, Defence for Children in collaboration with Leiden University has contributed with a paper on the 2019 Dutch Inquiry Committee on Historical Child Abuse in Alternative…

The antibiotic EVG7, developed in Leiden, has proven capable of fighting the dangerous gut bacterium C. difficile with only a minimal dose. What’s more, the bacterium is far less likely to return, a major issue with existing antibiotics. The research was published in Nature Communications.

Bacteria whirl around in the mouths of most people, forming dental plaques and sometimes causing nasty gum infections. Treponema denticola might be a dangerous pathogen, but not much is known about this bacterium. It was up to Ariane Briegel and her research group to change that.

For every period, it is a challenge to unearth the details of political trafficking; yet the effort needs to include all relevant persons, groups, and institutions – not only those wielding formal responsibilities. We hope to reinvigorate this effort by inviting specialists to present their research…

All the information about the Leiden University Global Fund (LUGF) funding instrument is given here, specifically the seed funding options for collaboration with regional partners. The LUGF awards seed funding to support regional collaborative initiatives.

Celebrate Leiden University’s 450th anniversary with the special International Staff Week Connecting New Opportunities, taking place from 3 to 5 September. Join academics and professionals to explore transformative developments and challenges of the 21st century in international higher education.

On 11 March, pharmaceutical company Janssen received approval to launch its corona vaccine on the European market. This made Janssen the fourth company to be given the green light by the European Medicines Agency. As Lead of the Janssen Campus in the Netherlands, Biology alumnus Bart van Zijll Langhout…

In the spring of 2024 the Faculty of Archaeology welcomed a new postdoc. Dr Adam Benfer, originally from the United States, occupies a double position as a researcher in the project of Alex Geurds and as the Faculty’s Data Steward. ‘It is pretty much what the title says: I steward data. Essentially,…

Lecture, SMILE - Experimental Linguistics series

Lecture, Workshop

In this flash interview we get a flash introduction of our President and alumna Annetje Ottow.

Medici kunnen veel repareren, maar ziekte voorkomen of uitstellen is beter. Daarvoor is vaak leefstijlverandering nodig en dat blijkt lastig. Gezondheidswetenschappers Sandra van Dijk (Universiteit Leiden) en Valentijn Visch (TU Delft) doen onderzoek naar de vraag hoe je mensen kunt helpen met gedragsverandering…

Lecture, Unfolding Finitudes

Lecture

The US intervention in Venezuela and the country’s ongoing instability pose risks for the Dutch Caribbean. How serious is that threat? ‘Dutch men and women will have to defend our external borders there,’ says Professor by Special Appointment of Kingdom Relations, Wouter Veenendaal.

Eighty years after its founding, the United Nations faces major challenges. Once established to prevent global conflict, the organisation now operates amid geopolitical tensions, prolonged wars and growing criticism. Joris Larik discusses this in Forbes.

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

Mathematics can help predict thrombosis. Mathematician Mark Alber has developed models that even aid in suggesting treatments. In the Kloosterman lecture on 27 June, he will explain how this works.

Mass, time, space, and complexity — physicists in Leiden are launching eight new research projects tackling some of the most fundamental themes in quantum mechanics. Their goal: to push the limits of current quantum theories.

Leiden academics Remco Breuker and Auke-Florian Hiemstra stand to win the title of Person of the Year.

Migraine is a brain disease. If it were simple, we would have solved it already'. That is the title of the inaugural lecture delivered by Professor of Neurology Gisela Terwindt on Friday 3 June. In her speech she emphasises the importance of research into the differences between women and men with m…

For a long time, even many researchers thought that guide dogs were a relatively modern invention. An accidental encounter with archival material showed university lecturer Krista Milne that guide dogs helped their blind owners as far back as the Middle Ages. Milne now has received an NWO XS grant to…

Museums have long focused on power, wealth and a few famous figures. But that is changing, says Valika Smeulders, head of the history department at the Rijksmuseum. What this change comprises and how it has come about is the subject of her keynote speech at the D&I Symposium on 11 January.

Hari Nugroho explores the role of local dynamics in shaping Indonesian labour movements. By focusing on the micro-level, this research reveals how labour organisation strategies are influenced by individual actors' personal histories, their interactions, and the way in which they respond the local economic…

In December 2024, Dr. Jonathan Singerton (University of Amsterdam) was the featured guest speaker at the last lunch talk of the Fall 2025 semester. A full house assembled to hear Dr. Singerton take us on a journey across the Habsburg Empire and to spots far-flung from Vienna. Dr. Singerton told us a…

How can we better prepare students for their practicals, so that they learn more from them? Marjo de Graauw and her colleagues want to renew science education. Together they will develop interactive teaching materials to introduce students to laboratory courses. They are receiving a SURF grant of €100,000…

Melinda Susanto is appointed as PhD candidate at the Institute for History since April 2020. She introduces herself below.

The Fieldwork NL report prize goes to the “Queer Joy in Motion” report, by bachelor students Dorota Olsavska, Marthe Baalbergen, Rielly Puchalski, and Rosa Graffé. Master student Imogen Cooney receives the Speckmann Award for her thesis ‘Decolonizing Faculty’.

Five Leiden research projects in history, law and AI have received SSH Open Competition M 2024 funding from the Dutch Research Council (NWO). The researchers have up to five years to work on a promising idea.

Democracy is under pressure all over the world. With the #DemocracyinAction project, university lecturers Sara Brandellero and Kamila Krakowska Rodrigues want to investigate how grassroots art projects manage to keep democracy alive.

Researcher Max van Duijn and PhD student Bram van Dijk apply language models to stories told by children to investigate empathy. For this research, they received the Best Paper Award at the Computational Natural Language Learning Conference in Singapore.

A diverse (ad hoc) committee will advise Leiden University’s Executive Board on its exhibitions policy in a broad sense, with a special focus on the painting by Rein Dool in the Academy Building.

The virtual Exhibition Gold Matters is now live and can be explored online. This exhibition is the result of collaborations between artists, members of mining communities, and researchers of the Gold Matters’ project. Curating the exhibition is a collaborative effort of the Gold Matters Team with Sabine…

ChatGPT, translation machines and bots: for Carole Tiberius, they are a piece of cake. On 1 January, she was appointed professor of Computational Linguistics. 'There ae two elements to the field: computer science and linguistics.'

Within the scope of innovating and connecting – the theme of our new Strategic Plan – I paid a visit to Brussels last week. It is important to give Leiden University a face in Brussels and to show our expertise, on Africa for instance.

The brief removal of Rein Dool’s ‘cigar-smoking white men’ painting generated a storm of reactions last November. Students, staff and alumni reflected on this at a symposium on Friday 26 May.

A big performance by André Rieu, food trucks in The Hague and more contact with the Royal Family: grand plans were announced in April to make the State Opening of Parliament (Prinsjesdag) a real ‘crowd puller’. For this year, however, we will just have to make do with slight differences in emphasis.…

175 years ago, the Netherlands took great strides towards parliamentary democracy with a revamped Constitution. Where does the Constitution stand today?

Two research projects focused on democracy and citizen collectives have been awarded grants through the 2024 round of the National Science Agenda’s (NWA) ‘Onderzoek op Routes door Consortia (ORC)’. Each project will receive around €6.8 million to get started immediately.

At the end of May, the Leiden English Language and Culture Programme, formerly known as the Department of English Language and Literature, celebrated its 75th anniversary (starting from the appointment of the first professor of English Studies). Over 220 alumni, staff present and past, and students…

In April 2025, Ms. Esther Rachow from The Hebrew University in Jerusalem presenting her ongoing doctoral research at an Austria Centre Leiden lunch-time talk. She answered a few questions about her visit below.

At a symposium on 26 May, experts, staff and students from Leiden University will discuss what should happen with Rein Dool’s painting in the Academy Building and what the guidelines for the University’s exhibition policy should be. These issues will be explored from diverse perspectives during the…

What can you learn about Bangladesh that cannot be found on Google? On 24 September, bachelor students of International Studies and Southeast Asian Studies were given an answer to that question. In a well-filled lecture room, the ambassador of Bangladesh, Riaz Hamidullah, gave a lecture about his co…

Neilabh Sinha was awarded a subsidy from NWO Promoties in de Geesteswetenschappen and started as a PhD candidate at the Institute for History in September. He introduces himself.

Tessa Verhoef from the Leiden Institute of Advanced Computer Science and Eduard Fosch-Villaronga from eLaw- Center for Law and Digital Technologies have written an article on how affective computing should be inclusive, diverse, and work for everyone.

We should mention differences in skin colour to our children because only then can we talk openly about prejudice and racism – and how to prevent them. This is what Professor Judi Mesman says in her book ‘Opgroeien in kleur’ (Growing up in Colour), which offers advice to parents. ‘Why is there only…

Lecture

On Tuesday 10 January, the Meijers Lecture was held followed by the New Year’s reception in the restaurant of the Kamerlingh Onnes Gebouw. Dean Joanne van der Leun opened the reception with a New Year’s speech. The following is a short overview of the event.

In the MS Cognitietour, psychologists and neuroscientists from Leiden University discuss the latest scientific knowledge with MS patients and their loved ones. This leads to insights: 'One lady told how much stress she felt from all those caregivers around her bed.'

There’s a lot that goes wrong in the treatment of patients with PTSD caused by childhood trauma. Endowed professor Maartje Schoorl wants to resolve this by bringing scientific research closer to the practice. Inaugural lecture on Friday 29 April.