Since graduating from Leiden Law School with master’s degrees in Jurisprudence & Philosophy of Law and Criminal Law, alumnus Allard Altena now works as a Public Prosecutor at the Dutch Public Prosecution Service. He says, ‘I leave work at the end of each day knowing I’ve done something useful.’

Leiden physicists have been awarded 1.5 million euros for developing a hybrid microscope that provided nanometer-resolution. 'The idea is to combine the resolution of electron microscopy with the pros of optical microscopes.'

In September, the Una Europa ELSEA project, Enhancing Scholarship in Eastern Africa, officially started. Now that the project has been running for a couple of months, it’s high time to check in and see how the project is going.

Hiltje Cleveringa seemed moved when on 16 January she was given the first copy of the biography of her father, Rudolph Cleveringa. Peppering his speech with a few cliff-hangers – including an incident concerning Churchill – biographer Kees Schuyt encouraged his audience to actually go read his book.

“Endophenotypes of Social Anxiety Disorder: Can we detect them and are they useful in clinical practice”

Jeroen Touwen has been reappointed as Vice-Dean of the Faculty of Humanities from 1 January. ‘The Faculty Board’s role is to serve the organisation: we try to manage the University as effectively as possible with the available resources, so that research and education can flourish.’

‘A tax crusader’... that’s how Ferd Grapperhaus, former Professor of Tax Law at Leiden University and father of the former Minister of Justice and Security, described himself. In his biography of Grapperhaus, Assistant Professor Rens Pieterse explains that he saw tax as a contribution to society.

Starting your PhD during two major crisis in your country; it happened to Kamaran Palani, PhD student at the Dual PhD Centre and ISGA who lives in Erbil, the capital of the Kurdistan Region of Iraq. In spite of the difficulties in his county, Palani (34) stuck to his PhD-research about the fluidity…

Accreditations. All study programmes have to deal with them and once every six years they cause a good amount of tension. How do you survive the assessment panel? And how does an accreditation proceed in times of corona? Chair of education Kim Beerden recently coordinated the accreditation for the research…

Self-driving cars, surgery robots, and stock market algorithms: the use of robots and Artificial Intelligence (AI) is rapidly increasing. What are the opportunities for this development, and what the dangers? The Honours Class ‘Robot Law: Regulating Robot and AI Technologies’ prepares students for the…

Psycholoog Dominique en een student vertellen over hoe Siggie kan helpen als je eenzaamheid ervaart.

Archaeologist David Fontijn was nominated for the University Teaching Prize. His students nominated him for this award for his innovative ways of online teaching. In the corona-year 2020-2021 he gave a new course and experimented with the way he taught. ‘It clearly appealed to the students, so we are…

Interdisciplinary Approaches to Disability: The MENA Region in the Modern Period Cairo 25-26 November 2018

Igor recently started his research master's in Archaeology. Now he is awarded the prestigious Raymond and Beverly Sackler Scholarship. The scholarship is given to promising master's students and PhD candidates and Igor is the first student of Archaeology to receive the grant. We interviewed Igor about…

Jorik ter Veer studied Political Science in Leiden. How does he look back on his student days?

An international team of astronomers, including Leiden PhD student Elia Pizzati, has observed several ancient quasars that, surprisingly, appear to be floating alone in the early universe (less than a billion years after the Big Bang). Until now, astronomers, based on models, assumed that quasars are…

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…

Another year's end draws near. And what a year it has been! On December 12th staff and students of the Faculty of Archaeology came together to celebrate and reminisce. Professor Joanita Vroom got us in a festive mood by telling tales of Byzantine banquets, while a chef served historical dishes to sa…

The thesis “Exit Peter Paul? Divergente toezichthoudersaansprakelijkheid in de Europese Unie voor falend financieel toezicht, bezien vanuit het Europeesrechtelijke beginsel van effectieve rechtsbescherming” (Exit Peter Paul? Divergent supervisory liability in the European Union for failing financial…

Starting 1 July 2020, Pieter Tops will hold the special chair Organised and Subversive Crime Studies. The chair will be hosted by the Institute Security and Global Affairs (ISGA) at Leiden University's Faculty Governance and Global Affairs. Pieter Tops is a lector at the Police Academy. He conducts…

What is the environmental impact of the fish on our plates? And is an electric car really more sustainable when we include the generation of electricity? Jeroen Guinée maps the environmental impact of products and technologies. He analyses them from raw material to waste disposal. He was appointed Professor…

Julia Cramer is the winner of NWO's Minerva Prize for 2017. Cramer will receive the prize for her research in the field of quantum science and technology.

Military veterans with posttraumatic stress disorder often have symptoms that are both chronic and complex. Professor by Special Appointment Eric Vermetten is looking for new ways to help them deal with these. One possible medicine: party drug MDMA.

Three Dutch-Belgian telescopes have started operating at the ESO La Silla Observatory in Chile. This so-called BlackGEM array will scan the southern sky to hunt for cosmic events that produce gravitational waves, such as mergers of neutron stars and black holes. Leiden astronomer Rudolf le Poole is…

The Young Alumni Network (YAN) organised a working visit to the National Museum in Amsterdam on Thursday 5 July. Alumni were able to take a look behind the scenes at the Museum and the excursion ended with an exclusive tour.

A partnership with the Leiden Leadership Programme: what does it bring you? Two partner organisations in the field of sustainability, Arcadis and Bioto, share their experiences: “It's great to be surprised by new insights.”

Giving all scientists at the Faculty the same opportunities, that’s what assistant professor Emily Strange stands for. As women face different challenges as scientists, RISE (Researchers in Science for Equality) provides a network and support group for women at the Faculty. Two months ago, Strange…

Unemployed people often need not only a financial safety net but also a stimulus to look for work. PhD candidate Heike Vethaak researched the effects of incentives used by benefit agencies, such as compelling people to widen their job search.

Since the beginning of September, it is a fact: our faculty has a new strategic plan. The plan outlines what we will collectively commit to in the coming years. Is that important? For sure, say our directors Suzanne van der Pluijm (Operations) and Bart de Smit (Education). ‘The purpose of a strategic…

Claartje Levelt is professor of First Language Acquisition. She researches how babies and toddlers learn their mother tongue. Besides her work, she enjoys being involved with music.

ChatGPT, the text-generating chatbot, has recently become available for anyone to use. Is this artificial intelligence (AI) tool a threat to our teaching?

Minority governments only become an option when attempts to form a government collapse. PhD candidate Corné Smit explored why such governments have become rare in the Netherlands and what advantages they might offer. ‘Broad majority coalitions often fail to make substantial progress on key issues.’

Two courses on Central Asia will be offered within the Leiden Central Asia Initiative, funded by the research profile area Asian Modernities and Traditions. 'History of Central Asia & Afghanistan' will be open to BA students of Middle Eastern Studies and 'Material Culture, Memory and Commemoration along…

Four female computer scientists share a common goal: to showcase the significant contributions of women in computer science and inspire their students. Together, they are organising this year’s Alice & Eve event, a one-day symposium dedicated to celebrating women in computer science. The event, scheduled…

A team of three students affiliated with Leiden University is shedding new light on the lives, diets, health, and mobility of individuals buried at the historic church site in Koudekerke, Zeeland. The project, a collaboration with the Walcherse Archeologische Dienst and funded by the Municipality of…

The new privacy laws make it more difficult to combat human trafficking: under-age victims are often not registered. In her lecture, Cleveringa Professor Corinne Dettmeijer called on everyone to be on the alert. 'We don't want to live in a society where people are treated as throw-away objects.'

The Faculty of Science has presented an infographic with tips and tricks for work stress. The reason for this was the Personnel Monitor 2018, which showed that work pressure is a problem for many employees at the Faculty. ‘It is important to start the discussion about work pressure, and to break the…

No sitting in lecture halls, no coffee at the JuCa: Leiden Law School students will have to follow lectures and do exams from home for the time being. A huge transition.

Children, cardiac surgery patients or people who are obese. How can we improve the dosing of painkillers for these patients? Hospital pharmacist Sjoerd de Hoogd of the St. Antonius Hospital in Utrecht investigated this. He combined data from the hospital with the knowledge and expertise of the Leiden…

Measurements on a superconducting material show an abrupt transition between a normal metal and a 'strange' metal. The really strange thing, however, is that this abruptness disappears when the temperature falls. 'We don't have any theoretical machinery for this', says theoretical physicist Jan Zaanen,…

On February 29 2024, the Humanities Career Service of Leiden University organised a career day to the European Union institutions in Brussels. Natalia Papageorgiou, student of the MA History (Politics, Culture and National Identities), talks about how the day went.

Before Maria Gabriela Palacio Ludeña became a lecturer International Studies at Leiden University, she was a public administrator in Ecuador. Her whole life she had a desire to teach and eventually she wound up at Leiden University.

The Leiden Hortus botanicus has received an inheritance of 5 million euros. This is a gift from the estate of Carla van Steijn, who was a loyal visitor to the Hortus during her lifetime. In accordance with her wishes, the gift will be used for new activities and to optimise accessibility for less-able-bodied…

A Dutch consortium has received €6.7 million to accelerate the development of nanomedicines together with patients. Researchers from Leiden University play a key role in the project.

It is late June, and on a windy meadow north of Leiden known as the Vrouw Vennepolder a group of archaeology students just hit the last ice age. Considering this involves manually pushing a ground core to a depth of 10 meters, this is no small feat. Even so, the taking of ground samples in this, at…

Textbooks in the Netherlands contain significantly fewer female than male characters and relatively few characters from a non-Western background. They also contain implicit stereotyping. This is what Judi Mesman, Professor of the Interdisciplinary Study of Societal Challenges at Leiden University, has…

The start of this year saw the opening of the LDE Centre for Governance, Migration and Diversity. The Centre looks at public administration and policy issues in the four South Holland cities from a multicultural perspective. What is unusual is that there are already master's graduates at the Centre.

For the duration of a month, the portraits of female professors only will hang in the Senate Chamber of Leiden University. This is the initiative of Athena’s Angels, who want more room for women, literally and figuratively. Vice-Rector Simone Buitendijk unveiled the portrait photos on 8 March.

Leiden Law Cast is a podcast made by Leiden Law School, Leiden University, for everyone who wants to learn more about current legal issues.

Using the motto 'Exploring humanities through the life of objects' the Thingsthattalk platform gives a voice to historical objects that are usually kept behind closed doors. Objects from various Leiden collections are going to be made public and placed within a historical and user context.