From medicines from snake venom to supercrops and the origin of words. Thirteen researchers from Leiden University will receive Open Competition XS grants from the Dutch Research Council (NWO).

Seven researchers from Leiden University have made a successful application to the Open Competition SSH (Social Sciences and Humanities) XS, a Dutch Research Council pilot programme.

What does it sound like when you create your own words in Chichewa? Can you decipher hieroglyphs after just one workshop? Visitors found answers to these and many other questions during the first edition of the Evening of Languages, held in the brand-new Herta Mohr Building. With a sold-out programme,…

Whispp, a Leiden-based speech technology start-up, is developing an app to help people who stutter express themselves more freely. Among those working together with Joris Castermans and his team at Whispp, are researchers and students from the Leiden University Centre for Linguistics (LUCL).

On Friday 16 February 2024, Rudolf E. de Jong passed away unexpectedly in Cairo. Since 2012, he was the director of the Netherlands-Flemish Institute in Cairo (NVIC), which he skillfully managed for 12 years. He was laid to rest in Amsterdam on 27 February. Rudolf was 65.

Four projects led by the Faculty of Humanities have been awarded KIEM grants. The researchers will receive €10,000 to carry out their plans.

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.

Leiden University and African Child Policy Forum hold ‘ground-breaking’ workshop on antimicrobial resistance (AMR) and human rights in Africa

There were no bitcoins or artificial intelligence when our civil code was compiled. This could cause problems.

The Mapping Slavery project will place markers that tell the story of Leiden’s slavery past. Why is this important and what does it mean for today’s society? Before the markers are placed, a panel came together on 24 March to discuss the slavery past of not only the city but the University too.

On Wednesday, 21 February, a diverse group of students, staff, and representatives from 21 embassies gathered in The Hague for International Mother Language Day. Under the banner of 'a bit of fun and many serious topics,' language took centre stage.

To truly help citizens, professionals sometimes need to dare to deviate from the rules. That was the main message during the meeting on ‘rebellious professionals’ in healthcare and well-being, held on 15 October in The Hague.

The Grotius Centre for International Legal Studies is proud to announce a fortified partnership with the International Bar Association to annually stage the largest moot competition focused on international criminal law: The International Criminal Court Moot Court Competition.

Women confined to the kitchen? Not in Scheveningen around 1900. There, some women ran entire shipping companies. This is according to new research by history student Sjors Stuurman. He compiled the results in a book he wrote for Muzee Scheveningen.

The ROBUST consortium, which is the initiative of the Innovation Center for Artificial intelligence (ICAI), has received 25 million euros from the Dutch Research Council (NWO) to strengthen fundamental AI research.

To mark the university’s 450th anniversary, the Leiden Discoveries science route has been updated and was relaunched on the Night of Discoveries. New signs in town and a revamped website tell Leiden residents and visitors the stories of the city’s spectacular discoveries.

Fiffy the chimpanzee had rapidly developed cataracts in both eyes that made her as good as blind. Eye doctors at the Leiden University Medical Center (LUMC) have now managed to replace the lenses in both her eyes. As far as we know, Fiffy, who is thought to be between 30 and 40 years old, is the first…

A few law students were given the opportunity to conduct an eight-week internship at the Rechtbank Den Haag. They took part in hearings as clerks, in discussions about cases in the judges’ chambers, and contributed to the formation of decisions. They held a presentation about their experiences during…

Polypeptide Therapeutic Solutions (PTS), a leader in the design, development and custom manufacturing of polyamino-acid based delivery systems for therapeutic drugs and the Leiden Academic Centre for Drug Research (LACDR) today announced a research collaboration to develop advanced drug delivery systems…

Hoe kan het dat universele mensenrechten wereldwijd niet hetzelfde in de praktijk worden gebracht?

Over the past weeks, thousands of students from Leiden University have filled in the National Student Survey (NSE). To thank them, the university is donating €3,637.75 to #wakeuptocorona.

Leiden University and the Municipality of The Hague signed a collaboration agreement on sustainability on 1 November. Their main goals are to build a network, share knowledge and explore the possibilities of a Climate Centre for the people of The Hague.

Oud-studenten gingen op 30 augustus weer de collegezalen in om hun vaste plekje op de banken op te zoeken tijdens Leiden Revisited. Bezoekers konden genieten van inspirerende lezingen, maar ook van een gezellige borrel, buffet, en livemuziek.

Professor Sarah de Rijcke will become the new Rector Magnificus on the Executive Board of Leiden University on 15 January 2026. She will succeed Professor Hester Bijl, who will become Rector Magnificus at Delft University of Technology.

Astronomers and surgeons from Leiden are collaborating with industry to develop an optical instrument that delivers faster, more accurate imaging of tumour tissue and abnormal blood flow during surgery.

For years, the late professor Marten Durieux personally mentored and funded students from Sudan to study physics in the Netherlands. Colleague Sense Jan van der Molen calls his endeavour remarkable: ‘Marten Durieux has done a great job with these students, at a time when diversity was not yet a big…

A memorial stone honouring professor and resistance hero Ben Telders was unveiled on 12 September at the site of the former concentration camp Bergen-Belsen.

Collaborating in drug discovery and health research was the goal of a visit to the Leiden Bio Science Park on 14 May by a Swedish delegation including His Majesty King Carl XVI Gustav of Sweden. The delegation visited Leiden University’s Faculty of Science.

The university campus at the Leiden Bio Science Park is flourishing. A new book tells the stories behind this remarkable metamorphosis.

Twenty-one dedicated teachers were awarded their Senior Teaching Qualification (SKO) on 21 January. Rector Magnificus Hester Bijl congratulated them in a ceremony in the Academy Building with an extra celebratory touch as the milestone of the 100th SKO certificate was reached.

The acquittal of Richard de Mos and his fellow party member has caused quite a stir in the Netherlands. Can De Mos simply return to local politics now? And has the issue finally been settled?

According to Nivja de Jong, second language acquisition is 'the most fascinating subject in linguistics'. As a recently appointed professor of Second Language Acquisition and Pedagogy, she studies the question of how best to teach people a new language.

The Voices of Africa platform is ten years old and has just recently won the annual popularisation prize of the Netherlands Graduate School of Linguistics (LOT). High time for a chat with Jenneke van der Wal, Maarten Mous and Nina van der Vlugt about the importance of the platform and plans for the…

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.

Leiden University is known for its pioneering research and teaching. By offering education to professionals (lifelong learning), we want to bring this research and teaching expertise to the field and thus further increase our impact on society. With the aid of a grant from Leiden University Academy,…

The Leiden Institute for Area Studies (LIAS) has a new Director of Education. Rint Sybesma was appointed with effect from 1 September. ‘I am looking forward to getting to know the institute even better.’

‘Om de problemen in de jeugdbescherming op te kunnen lossen heb ik de gemeenten nodig’, zei minister Weerwind van Rechtsbescherming onlangs in de Tweede Kamer. Maar volgens hoogleraar jeugdrecht Mariëlle Bruning moet het rijk stoppen met het verwijzen naar andere partijen en zélf nu zorgen dat de boel…

Her Royal Highness Princess Beatrix of the Netherlands will attend the Dies Natalis ceremony at Leiden's Pieterskerk on Friday 7 February to celebrate our 450th anniversary.

Dr Gianclaudio Malgieri, Associate Professor of Law at eLaw, will receive the AI Policy Leaders Academia Award from CAIDP Europe (Center for AI and Digital Policy Europe) alongside Professor Alessandro Mantelero from the Politecnico di Torino. The award is 'for their collective call on EU policymakers…

Prof Harold Linnartz has been reappointed Director of Education of the bachelor and master programmes of Astronomy. The appointment is for a period of four years, until 1 October 2026.

On Tuesday 7 September 2021, the new Faculty year was opened with the Leiden Law Op 1 Talkshow. Various guests shared their thoughts and expectations for the new academic year. Lotte Kremers and Bastiaan Rijpkema presented the show.

Egbert Jongen is appointed Professor of Economics and Socio-Economic Policy at Leiden University from 1 November 2023. His expertise is in the field of socio-economic policy, inequality, and the labour market.

The Neumark-Nord 2 site in central Germany, dates back to 125,000 years ago. During an interglacial period with temperatures similar to those today, Neanderthals where doing something we previously thought happened only tens of thousands of years later.

The coronavirus crisis had a major impact on the judicial system in the Netherlands: courts closed at the start of the pandemic and instead held virtual hearings. Research now shows that things did not always go smoothly.

Via expedited proceedings at Leeuwarden Court of Appeal, a mother is trying to impose a relatively new treatment for her 15-year-old daughter’s eating disorder. The girl is suffering from anorexia nervosa and if she does not receive urgent treatment which the girl herself supports, there is a chance…

Television presenter and journalist Twan Huys will be a lecturer in Journalism and New Media at Leiden University from 1 September 2024.