Lecture, Tuesday Talks: Science Insights

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…

Lecture, Tuesday Talks: Science Insights

Lecture

Welcome to Leiden University

Lecture, Studium Generale

Lecture

During the panels, alumni from all 4 FSW study programmes (Cultural Anthropology, Education and Child Studies, Political Science and Psycology) will share their experiences in their field of work. Each panel will focus on one field of work and will host 4 alumni, one from each FSW study programme.

Laura Kamsma (31) has been coordinating the International Office (IO) of FGGA for a few months now. An introduction to the ambitious Nijmegen native, who has set herself the goal of making the International Office more visible: 'Knock on our door if you have an internationalisation issue. Now you can…

The past year was once again a year of outstanding achievements and strong engagement for the Faculty of Social Sciences. In this hall of fame, we proudly highlight a selection of awards, grants and appointments as part of the many valuable contributions — visible and behind the scenes — that together…

The MA International Relations program at Leiden University convened a roundtable forum at Leiden University The Hague Campus to examine the international and domestic stakes of Rodrigo Duterte’s arrest and detention under an International Criminal Court (ICC) warrant.

How do we deal with large sources of greenhouse gases? Do schools provide a socially-inclusive environment for all children? And how can we protect Earth’s nature? These questions have two things in common: they are complex global challenges, and data can help answer them. Mitra Baratchi is computer…

From 13 to 16 July, Leiden will host the EuroScience Open Forum (ESOF), the largest multidisciplinary scientific conference in Europe. Lars van Doorn from Leiden Law School will give a presentation.

Some governments and companies are pursuing a more circular economy, but what is the best way to get there? An international group of industrial ecology researchers wrote a report that stresses the importance of including the scientific side into policies and practices. ‘We feel an obligation to support…

The plan was to research the years surrounding the creation of the signature H.P. Berlage building of the Kunstmuseum Den Haag, but due to the lockdown, University Lecturer Laurie Kalb Cosmo has hardly been able to visit museums. Yet she succeeds in continuing her research for the Museums, Collections…

The university's CO2 footprint - a visual representation of Leiden University's environmental impact - is calculated every year. The CO2 footprint for 2020 shows a striking break in the trend in terms of energy use, mobility and waste.

When and how to use the concept of “culture” . To medical anthropologists this is a core question, but also a challenging one.

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.

However tempting it may be to lock yourself in your room or in favourite library nook in the days running up to an important exam, it's not a very wise choice, stresses neuroscientist Judith Schomaker.

Stephan Raaijmakers has been Professor of Communicative AI since 1 May. Prior to this, he had held this position for five years as professor by special appointment. How has his approach to AI changed in that time?

Cybersecurity doesn’t start with your first job – it starts with your first phone. According to Sofian Fesenko, a student of Crisis and Security Management (CSM), digital resilience needs to be built from a young age. That’s why he developed an educational card game to raise children’s awareness of…

Three Leiden professors have recently been awarded the most prestigious scientific accolade in the Netherlands: Maria Yazdanbakhsh and Marc Koper have been awarded a Spinoza Prize and Judi Mesman a Stevin Prize. They received their prizes on 13 October.

With their thesis research, Master’s students from Leiden, Rotterdam and Delft help solve real-world problems in The Hague Southwest. That is the aim of the Thesis Project. We spoke to two students who are participating in the project.

In zoos, at festivals and in a mobile lab at the market: everywhere, Mariska Kret tries to understand human and animal emotions with her distinctive behavioural research. Now she has received the Mercator Sapiens Stimulus of €1 million for her efforts.

Anti-immigration protests over asylum seekers receive extensive attention, but PhD candidate Clare Fenwick says it’s a vocal minority taking to the streets. 'The silent majority might also have migration concerns, like job losses due to labour migration, but these views seem to remain outside public…

Anyone who wanted to get an impression of the Dutch East Indies between 1800 and 1945 quickly turned to travel literature. Large groups of readers devoured non-fiction accounts of the island empire on the other side of the world – and were given a one-sided picture. Most of the sources that reached…

October and November not only bring a number of proud Political Science graduates, it is also the season to determine who wrote the best bachelor’s thesis. For 2021-2022, fifteen theses were nominated. During the various graduation ceremonies the two final winners were announced: Essi Maria Teresia…

You have prepared a research project, put together a plan, and you are ready to travel to the country where you will be conducting your fieldwork. What do you do when Covid suddenly makes that impossible? Nadia Sonneveld was forced to relocate her project Living on the Other Side to a hybrid form: ‘It…

In this series the Vice-Dean and portfolio holder of education in the board of the Faculty of Archaeology will reflect on the state of education. Posts can range from shedding light on current national shifts in the university landscape to arguments as to why it’s important to be timely with designing…

On Wednesday 1 September, the first thirteen students of the new BA Urban Studies at Leiden University, received their diplomas in person in The Hague. During a festive graduation ceremony, they were congratulated by rector magnificus Hester Bijl.

Violette Defourt came to Leiden for her master’s just before Covid hit. Four years later, she is leading her own biotech company, which aims to radically speed up diagnostics.

Are you working at Leiden University and researching migration regimes outside of the Global North? Are you interested in doing fieldwork or a research visit at one of our partner universities? Then you might want to join the Leiden team of the EU-funded Marie Curie Staff Exchange Network on non-western…

Knowing whether or not a treatment is working just by wearing your watch? Data scientist Ahnjili ZhuParris has identified a lot of opportunities for the use of machine learning in clinical research to monitor test subjects at home.

The presence and participation of interest groups in policymaking processes has become a crucial component of Western democracies. These groups link society and policymakers and influence public policy choices. Their function however, is often taken for granted and not very well researched. Adrià Albareda…

Many people are wondering whether to vote strategically or not in the parliamentary elections on Wednesday. This raises at least three important questions: what is strategic voting, how do you know if you are a strategic voter yourself, and what do you need to do to use your strategic vote well?

‘What if we switch off all the lights one evening? That idea crossed my mind from time to time. And when I mentioned it to a taxi driver one day, he said: “Oh, you mean: lights out, stars on!” That’s not completely true, of course, because the stars are always on, but his phrase summed up the idea n…

Students stream into the lecture hall, handing in their mobile phones at the door. Once everyone’s seated, silence descends and all eyes turn to the large screen at the front of the lecture hall. A live connection has been set up with the prison where Marco is a long-term inmate. Today, the students…

How safe are the dozens of apps on our phone? And how do we make sure organisations don’t get hacked? Cybersecurity expert Olga Gadyatskaya works on all these kind of security issues. Next to that, she hopes to inspire young girls to consider a career in cybersecurity. ‘Too many young women think: I’m…

December 2020 saw the crowning publication of the Landscapes of Survival project by Professor Peter Akkermans. Its main topic is human habitation in marginal environments like the deserts of the Arabian Peninsula. ‘The people living here built their own society, and they would not have viewed it as…

Confetti, stilt walkers and the new Einstein Fountain. On Monday, 2 September, the Gorlaeus Building of the Faculty of Science was festively opened. Together with Constantijn van Oranje, our students cut the ribbon. Dean Jasper Knoester: ‘The building is ready, now it is up to our students and researchers…

Working together in times of change. With enthusiasm, passion and connection as our keywords. That was the message emphasised by administrators Jasper Knoester and Luc Sels at the start of this new year for our Science faculty. ‘Hope for a better world means working together actively towards progres…

What are the often invisible cognitive consequences of multiple sclerosis? Maureen van Dam mapped these out during her doctoral research. 'People usually notice the physical symptoms, but the cognitive symptoms deserve at least as much attention.'

What started with an old Soviet camera and a darkroom in London grew into a lifelong passion. Developmental biologist Michael Richardson has been capturing nature - from wild coastal plants to microscopic details in the lab - since his childhood.

Biologist Marcel Schaaf is one of four science faculty members who achieved the Senior Teaching Qualification in Leiden last year. How was that and what drives him? ‘Students receive way too often feedback that they cannot put into practice.’

As Professor of Translational Neuro-oncology, Marike Broekman researches how brain tumour treatment can be improved. She will discuss this in her inaugural lecture along with her work as a neurosurgeon and the importance of a positive workplace culture.

Cancer research generates massive amounts of data, but traditional tools often fail to fully harness their potential. How can we unlock this data to provide better treatments for cancer patients? PhD candidate Marina Gorostiola González explored this by using advanced data analysis techniques to guide…

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.

How do opinions form and change in large groups of people? That's not just a sociological question, it's a mathematical one. PhD candidate Federico Capannoli studied opinion dynamics. He defended his thesis on November 19.

A microscope with incredible sharpness that leaves samples unharmed – Guido Stam helped develop one. During his PhD research, he combined light and electrons to study biological samples. ‘We can now measure things that simply weren’t possible before.’