Marike Knoef has won an award on the 34th Award Ceremony of the World Cultural Council (WCC).

K-pop band BTS joining the Korean military is a compulsory obligation, one with increased meaning as tension builds on the Korean Peninsula and around the world, postdoc Aleydis Nissen writes in an article in The Diplomat.

What is Leiden University doing to make its buildings future-proof and independent of fossil energy?

UBL, Leiden University Libraries, is doing all it can to continue to offer its services. Even now the motto is, ‘work from home’. Who is doing want and how are things going?

It was a memorable start to September. While Leiden marked the opening of the academic year, The Hague celebrated the launch of three new degree programmes. Students were welcomed on a blue carpet rolled out at the entrance to the lecture halls.

Leiden researcher Ethan Mark has a mission, he explains in the alumni magazine Leidraad. He wants us to take off our Eurocentric glasses when we study the Second World War. We have focused on ourselves for far too long; after 75 years, it’s about time we listened to stories from the rest of the worl…

The secular West is struggling with the rise of AI, but so too is Muslim Southeast Asia. What can we learn from each other?

How have human-environmental entanglements changed in the Gulf of San Miguel, Darien, Panama, from the first traces human practices through to the present?

Amerindian intra- and inter-insular relationships and social organization in the pre-colonial Windward Islands.

The people behind The Hague Journal of Diplomacy and its online platform.

This project explores the decline of shifting cultivation in Northeast India. What is the impact on society of people’s deepening engagement with markets and the state?

The Terrorism and Political Violence research group at Leiden University examines the causes of radicalisation, the tactics of extremist groups, and the effectiveness of counter-terrorism policies. We also explore the role of the media and the influence of postcolonial legacies in the Global South,…

To be eligible for Applied Archaeology at Leiden University, you must meet the following admission requirements.

Tracking early human behaviour through plant processing and -exploitation.

To be eligible for African Studies at Leiden University, you must meet the following admission requirements.

Below you can find lists of Leiden-based and international organizations working on Central Asia, and an overview of useful resources on Central Asia.

Many of the journal's issues contain short contributions from practitioners of diplomacy. These practitioners' essays offer unique insights into the world of diplomacy and they serve as a source of inspiration for researchers.

People in Asia increasingly feel the need for a strong identity. This is the consequence of developments such as globalisation and the realisation that Asian countries such as China and India are becoming new world powers. Professor Hilde De Weerdt studies how political ideas and national identity spread…

Research on the morality of life insurance. What issues are raised when insurance companies define responsibility and solidarity? Has insurance changed since the crisis of 2007?

The relationship between States and foreign corporations are regulated by international economic law and international investment law in particular. Any disputes between States and foreign corporations must therefore also be solved by reference to this body of public international law, for example when…

Onderzoek van de onderzoeksgroep 'War, Peace and Justice'

To be eligible for the MA Ancient History at Leiden University, you must meet the following admission requirements.

The two-year Research Master in Asian Studies equips you with advanced and in-depth knowledge of a region and discipline within the field of Asian Studies.

To be eligible for Archaeology (research) at Leiden University, you must meet the following admission requirements.

To be eligible for the MA Beyond Borders: Global and European History at Leiden University, you must meet the following admission requirements.

To be eligible for Governance of Migration and Diversity at Leiden University, you must meet the following admission requirements.

To be eligible for History of Inequality and Power at Leiden University, you must meet the following admission requirements.

Alumni event, Arts and Culture

Bringing research and teaching closer together is part of the mission of Leiden University. The 'Career Policy for Academic Staff' working group that has draw up new guidelines for appointing academic staff discovered that the University has many members of staff who do not conduct research.

The two instruments of ESA's space telescope Euclid have taken their first test images. The first images indicate that the space telescope will achieve the scientific goals for which it was designed - and possibly much more. Euclid will create a 3D map of a third of the sky, allowing scientists to study…

New results from the Kilo-Degree Survey (KiDS) show that the Universe is almost 10 percent more homogeneous than previously thought. The new KiDS map was created using the partly Dutch OmegaCAM on ESO's VLT Survey Telescope on Cerro Paranal in Northern Chile. An international team of astronomers from,…

Koen Keijzer combined three mathematical models into one unified system capable of making meaningful predictions about how cells form blood vessels. This helps biologists studying the chaotic, leaky blood vessels found in and around tumours.

How can we best treat infectious diseases in people with obesity? Hospital pharmacist and PhD researcher Koen van Rhee studied how obesity affects blood levels of two commonly used medicines. He also developed a method for pharmaceutical companies to test new drugs on this patient group.

Investigating the intercultural connections that shaped practices of knowledge production in colonial Dutch Brazil.

EL CID has started! This is the week when new students have the chance to get to know the city and student life. Some of the mentors and first-years introduce themselves.

Leiden University’s Executive Board has appointed Erwin Muller as Vice Rector of Organisational Development. In this role, he will help further professionalise and improve the university’s organisation as per the Strategic Plan.

On 22–24 October 2025, Leiden University welcomed scholars, policymakers and higher education leaders for the Una Europa Conference on Academic Freedom. Organised by the AFITE project team and supported by Una Europa Seed Funding 2024, the three-day programme examined current pressures on academic freedom…

Leiden Observatory is going to use a new technique to carry out calculations on gravitational lensing measurements. They will do this is the context of research into the formation of elliptical galaxies. Alessandro Sonnenfeld (University of Tokyo) who developed this technique joined the research team…

Cells in our body are constantly performing small tasks, such as repairing wounds. They exert force by changing shape. But how do cells translate their shape into exerting a force in a specific direction? Experimental and theoretical Leiden physicists have now found a clue to answer this question. Cells’…

This is an Erasmus+ International Credit Mobility project of Leiden Law School with three universities in Kenya.

Institute of Environmental Sciences (CML)

My research project aims to analyze reasons of the European Union’s (EU) inadequacy to develop a strong Common Security and Defense Policy (CSDP) with regard to the role of main EU member states, namely Germany and the United Kingdom (UK) and find the answer of how the EU overcome the CSDP question…

VODAN Africa started as a platform to enable access to critical data needed from Africa to fight the novel COVID-19. The initiative was inspired by the experience from the Liberia Ebola Virus outbreak in 2014: early detection requires contact tracing. Inclusion of the most vulnerable is critical to…

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