Wat kun je als burger doen wanneer de overheid je persoonsgegevens gebruikt en daarmee besluiten neemt waar je het niet mee eens bent? Fatma Çapkurt promoveerde op een onderzoek hiernaar. Burgers moeten verwerking van hun gegevens beter kunnen beoordelen.

What exactly does it mean when your doctor says you have a ‘good chance’ of survival? Leiden researchers discovered that there is a big difference in how people interpret such probability phrases. And that can be a problem, warns lead researcher Sanne Willems in her blog post.

These days we do not just have wars and civil wars – more of a global civil war, says Bashir Azizi, who received a PhD in April 2020 for his thesis on global citizenship. The second edition of his thesis was recently published.

Professor Ton Liefaard has worked to improve the position of children since his academic career began.

Not all students spend the holiday season with family or friends. That is why the university is organising the fifth edition of the Winter Weeks this year. The goal remains unchanged: to offer both international and Dutch students who stay in Leiden or The Hague during the Christmas break a warm and…

An evolutionary 'trap' that has haunted crested and marbled newts for 25 million years: Leiden researchers have uncovered a mysterious DNA error that should not be able to arise – yet persists all the same. How is that possible? PhD candidate James France found new clues.

How do we at Humanities ensure a better work balance and more job satisfaction? A group of colleagues considered that question on Tuesday afternoon, 31 January. Two members of Academia in Motion also joined in the discussion.

How should we address our colonial heritage? And how digital and accessible are our collections? Outgoing State Secretary Fleur Gräper spoke with researchers and heritage specialists about this on 25 January.

Communication is the transmission of information. All day long we are busy explaining and making things clear to each other, but exactly how we do that varies from language to language. Associate Professor Jenneke van der Wal delved into African Bantu languages for a Vidi project.

Research

Afghans who came to the Netherlands in a hurry, refugees who were used as leverage by Belarus and boat refugees who tried to reach Europe in an increasingly desperate manner: the newspapers were once again filled with news about migrants. Today, on International Migrants Day, we talk to professor Marlou…

Skåne University Hospital, Lund University and Leiden University Medical Center will work together to expand their research, teaching and development relating to Advanced Therapy Medicinal Products. That is the essence of a Memorandum of Understanding signed at SciLifeLab near Stockholm on Wednesday…

Nano-plastics cause malformations. Meiru Wang, researcher at the Institute of Biology Leiden, looked at the extreme effects polystyrene nano-particles could have, using chicken embryos as a model. Her results were quite alarming. Especially as nano-particles are everywhere. In the air, floating through…

Hordes of photographers, students trying to catch a glimpse and take selfies, and cheering people at the entrance to Wijnhaven. Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and Prime Minister Mark Rutte were received like true pop stars, in the late afternoon at Leiden University’s Campus The Hague.

With the number of externally funded research projects at the university on the rise and funding bodies setting ever-stricter requirements, it can be challenging to keep track of budgets, deadlines and reporting. The new Vidatum tool makes managing external projects easier for researchers and research…

We all know smoking is bad for our health. But we might not have known that the cigarette filters that litter our streets also impact the environment. Esther Kentin is a lecturer at Leiden Law School. She is raising awareness of the University’s cigarette butt problem.

How do digital technologies affect adolescent mental health and resilience? How do we foster a secure online environment? How should we deal with increasing rates of online crimes among adolescents? During the mini-symposium ‘The effect of the online world on adolescents’, presented by the interdisciplinary…

Several years ago, two amateur archaeologists from Brabant discovered over a hundred Roman coins near to Berlicum in the north of the province. After years of research, it now appears that the location, close to a ford in the river, was a site for offerings. Another interesting fact is that the coins…

Anthropologist Rodrigo Ochigame studies how AI is changing the practice of scientific research. From astrophysics to mathematics to climate science, they find that the adoption of new AI models is raising questions about what counts as reliable scientific evidence.

To tackle the high workload at our university, and at the insistence of the University Council, the Executive Board launched the Workload Reduction Fund last year. The first fund-financed projects have since begun. Two staff members explain how their ideas can help others.

To support policies and decision-making on sustainability, it is important to involve citizens and stakeholders in the process. The term used for this in Public Administration is 'participation'. Professor Eefje Cuppen observes that things still often go wrong with participation. Inaugural lecture on…

Victoria Nyst's love for sign language was sparked when she accidentally ended up at a deaf school while studying African linguistics. The university lecturer has since been awarded a Vici grant to research the history of these languages.

‘Raising awareness of the disorder is crucial since borderline personality disorder (BPD) still faces considerable stigma ’, says Anne Krause-Utz (Clinical Psychology) . Together with an international team of excellent scientists, Krause-Utz provides an update of current knowledge about this disorder,…

Jasper Knoester is the dean of the Faculty of Science. How is he doing, what exactly does he do and what does his day look like? In each newsletter, Jasper gives an insight into his life.

For the first time, an international group of astronomers have seen the heat glow of two ice giant planets colliding. They could also observe the resultant dust cloud move in front of the parent star several years later. Led by Leiden astronomer Matthew Kenworthy, they monitored the star's brightness…

‘What I find most alluring about soil life is that you can steer it,’ researcher Martijn Bezemer of the Institute Biology Leiden (IBL) reveals. ‘You can ask: What do you want? And then I can transform the soil into something you need. At least, that is what we thought.’

What determines healthy behavior and how do you promote healthy choices and routines? These are a few questions currently being addressed by Marieke Adriaanse, recently appointed Professor of Behavioral Intervention in Population Health Management at the Leiden University Medical Center (LUMC).

What’s at stake at the NATO summit in The Hague? Three academics from Leiden share their insights.

As a mathematician, Fred Rohde (1948) explored the world of numbers. As a photographer, he captured demonstrations. And now he’s reconstructing his mother’s wartime story – an extraordinary tale of her stay with an Austrian family, the inventors of asbestos cement.

The documentary ‘De Stem van het Kind’ (The Voice of the Child) gives an impressive insight into the work of juvenile court judges. Documentary maker Pieter Fleury, Professor of Children’s Rights Ton Liefaard and juvenile court judge Johan Visser worked together for the past seven years to make the…

On 26 November historian Jan Grabowski and sociologist Barbara Engelking will both give the Cleveringa Lecture. They wrote a book about the Holocaust in Poland and were taken to court for defamation.

The child benefits scandal caused significant harm to families. The independent Hamer Commission specifically investigated the link between the scandal and the removal of children from their homes. Public Administration student Benito Walker was a member of this commission and shares his experiences…

Bob de Brabandere discovered his deep passion for cinema through a minor in Film and Theatre Studies. He currently serves as Assistant Manager at Bioscopen Leiden and as a programmer for the Leiden International Film Festival, which commences on 9 October.

On 7 and 8 November 2024, the International Centre for Counter-Terrorism (ICCT), the Institute of Security & Global Affairs at Leiden University, and The Netherlands’ National Coordinator for Security and Counter Terrorism (NCTV) partnered to host a ‘Blue-Sky’ Terrorist Exploitation of Artificial…

After the May elections a new University Council has now taken seat. The university democracy is the result of the long-lived national student protests in 1969. Students from Leiden joined the protests for greater representation, although their actions were less revolutionary than at other universities.…

What if I completely changed everything? A subject without lectures or exams, where the right answer is not important and where students work with their hands. With this idea, Michiel Brentjens reformed the course Radioastronomy. His students are so enthusiastic about this approach that they nominated…

The Educational Advice and Quality Assurance department of the Faculty of Humanities has evaluated 38 recent educational assessments. What can we learn from the course of these inspections?

Whether finding signals of dark matter or discovering hydrogen in the vicinity of exoplanets, Leiden astronomers are world players in their field, and they are part of a long tradition: Leiden was the first university in the world to have its own observatory.

Like many moot court competitions around the world, the Leiden-Sarin International Air Law Moot Court Competition was conducted fully online this year. The International Air Law Moot Court is an unparalleled forum for bringing together students and aviation professionals who share a passion for air…

Why does a medicine work well for one person, but cause side effects in another? Research by Laura de Jong shows that it’s not just our DNA that matters – other medicines and illnesses can also affect how our bodies respond.

Leiden University is switching to a new system for HR, finance and purchasing on 1 January 2026, after 27 years of using SAP. We spoke to Wouter Peters, Director of ASSC and Programme Director of BAS, about what this means for the university and you as a member of staff.

What motivates citizens to participate in a citizen science project on plastic pollution? And does that motivation change over time? Liselotte Rambonnet tried to answer these and other questions with her research on the Clean Rivers (‘Schone Rivieren’) project. Rambonnet is a PhD student at the Institute…

Why do vulnerable groups fail to make use of benefits that they are entitled to? This is what Max ten Velde researched in his Master’s in Management of the Public Sector thesis, which has been nominated for the Netherlands Court of Audit’s thesis prize.

As technology transforms healthcare and services come under mounting pressure, one question remains the same: Will the advice or treatment offered help patients lead the lives they want to live? In her inaugural lecture, Professor Maxime Kummeling stresses the importance of quality.

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How you think about yourself is important for the choices you make. Adolescents are faced with choosing a study programme that will determine their future, while their self-image is still under development. Tough choice? Research by psychologist Laura van der Aar has shown that taking a training course…

De klimaattransitie is in volle gang: de vervuilende industrie moet plaatsmaken voor duurzame productiemethoden. Werknemers in deze industrie zullen hierdoor nieuwe banen moeten vinden. Dat zal niet iedereen lukken. Heb oog voor die groep, waarschuwt politiek econoom Lars van Doorn.

Parents’ talk about new stimuli such as persons or objects strongly affects how avoidant or fearful their child will react. No stronger effect was found when parents had an anxiety disorder or in children with fearful temperaments. Publication by a team of Leiden psychologists in 'Clinical Child and…

The Veni grant is awarded annually by NWO (Netherlands Organisation for Scientific Research). This year, multiple researchers from Leiden University and 2 researchers who will soon be working at the university will receive a Veni grant from the NWO. Thanks to this grant, which can amount to up to 320,000…

Alumni and researchers met at two well-attended alumni dinners in Yogyakarta and Jakarta. The alumni reminisced about their time in Leiden and got to see their lecturers once again.