Each year the LUF Committee for Academic Expenditure awards grants to research and education projects. These grants for academic talent are often an important step towards grants from NWO and other institutions.

In De Kookshow, Universiteit Van Nederland explores the scientific world behind food. Ever wondered which senses influence how tasty you find something? And why do you always have room for pudding after a meal? Leiden historian Kim Beerden is among the scholars providing answers.

The Institute of Criminal Law and Criminology’s ‘Vulnerable Groups and Inequality’ research project draws on a number of disciplines.

Bachelor’s students Dana Huisman, Marleen Kop, Sam Wichers Schreur and Adriënne de Zoeten were granted the Speckmann Award for their Fieldwork NL report ‘Samen Verder: een project gefocust op vrouwen, taal en integratie'. Alumna Shirley van der Maarel received the Master's Speckmann award for her innovative…

Many of our staff and students have won an award, received a grant, obtained an academic fellowship for their quality or have been socially engaged due to their specific expertise. See below for an overview per year.

On Monday 18 March at 10:45 a deadly shooting took place on the 24 Oktoberplein in Utrecht, killing three people and severely injuring five others. Leiden University expresses its solidarity with the families left behind in the wake of this horrendous and regrettable incident. Several researchers of…

On 12 November Ingrid Leijten was a guest on Dutch NOS NPO Radio 1 programme Met het Oog op Morgen. She was asked to speak about the right to freedom of expression.

As part of its plans to introduce a stricter asylum policy, the Dutch cabinet wants to expand checks at internal borders within the EU. Professor of Law and Society Maartje van der Woude tells Dutch daily newspaper NRC that this is a symbolic measure: ‘Border checks will not counter the right to seek…

Op dinsdag 4 februari 2020 kreeg universitair docent kinderrechten Stephanie Rap de KNAW Early Career Award 2019 uitgereikt. Ze kreeg de prijs voor haar onderzoek naar de betekenis van internationale kinderrechten.

Together with four European partner universities heritage specialist Dr Monique van den Dries has been granted an Erasmus+ project (EU-CUL) by the European Commission. This project sets up a unique cooperation between educational scientists and academic heritage specialists. It will study how universities…

Daan Weggemans, researcher at the Institute for Security and Global Affairs, discusses in the morning podcast of NU.nl whether the Netherlands is able to judge and guide the return of Syrian mothers and children.

Laura van Broekhoven always knew she wanted to study archaeology, and that’s exactly what she did. Now this Leiden alumna is director of the Pitt Rivers Museum, one of the four museums of the University of Oxford.

Lecture, Annual Leiden Terra Incognita Lecture

Inaugural lecture

PhD defence

The world is full of wars, and no war is without its dead. What happens to the bodies of fatal casualties of armed conflict? The winner of the faculty Jongbloed Thesis Prize 2015 is Welmoet Wels (Public International Law). Her thesis Dead body management in armed conflict: paradoxes in trying to do…

PhD defence

Researchers from the Institute for Science in Society (Radboud University Nijmegen) and CWTS (Leiden University) organized a workshop on the use of IT Tools in academic publishing on 5-6 June 2018.

The Amsterdam media played a major role in the rise and fall of Dutch Brazil, the colony held briefly by the Dutch West India Company in the 17th century. This is the conclusion reached by Professor of Maritime History Michiel van Groesen in his book ‘Amsterdam’s Atlantic’.

PhD defence

When we think of the history of Dutch slavery, the areas that spring to mind are primarily the Antilles and Suriname. However, until the end of the eighteenth century there were also Dutch plantation colonies in neighbouring Guyana. Bram Hoonhout’s book ‘Borderless Empire’ describes this forgotten h…

Sinds vorig jaar staan er gekleurde pilaren op de universiteitscampus. Met deze ‘Act of Kindness Pillars’ wordt eenzaamheid bij studenten tegengegaan.

Due to technological and societal developments, we are being flooded with more information than our brains can process. How does this affect our decision-making, both as individuals and as a society? And can we learn to make better choices? This is what Lotte van Dillen will explore with her profess…

After a long night of partying, hundreds of people head to Leiden’s Van der Werfpark early on 3 October for a good singsong. Lecturer in Dutch literature Olga van Marion helped compile the new songbook for the occasion. Which songs were left out and which new hits have taken their place?

Junk news sites with unknown names such as Trendnieuws and Viraal Vandaag reach millions of Dutch people thanks to their Facebook pages. Messages from those pages are much more often shared and liked than messages from pages from well-known news media such as De Telegraaf, NOS and NU.nl. This is shown…

Arts and culture, LUCIS Middle East Culture Market

On 3 December 2019 Hanna Bosdriesz defended her dissertation on the fight against impunity for grave human rights violations in Latin America.

Researchers at Leiden University and the National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM) have launched an initiative to learn more about the experiences of migrants travelling through the Darién Gap, with a focus on forced migration.

How did Google’s computer programme AlphaGo become so good at board game Go that it could defeat the world champion? On June 29, developer Aja Huang will speak about this during a lecture in the Gorlaeus building.

A revolutionary supercomputer with energy-efficient parts that are available in the shops. Professor of Computational Astrophysics Simon Portegies Zwart has been awarded an NWO Medium Grant to build this processing giant, which will have the power of a supercomputer but requires only one percent of…

PhD defence

Writer and columnist Nicolien Mizee will be Leiden University’s new writer in residence from autumn 2023.

PhD defence

The nominees for the IRO thesis prize 2023 and the Prof. Dr. J.Th.J. van den Berg-prijs 2023. Who wrote the best bachelor theses in Political Science?

A significant percentage of children who have spent a period in youth care institutions or foster homes since 1945 received inadequate protection from physical, psychological and sexual violence. Interventions by supervisory authorities in cases involving violence were inadequate.

Ramsey Albers wins Political Science Master’s Thesis Prize 2022

This week the Turkish army invaded North East Syria. The Turkish invasion might well have had an unintended side effect: the escapement of thousands of Islamic State terrorists held in captivity. Experts on terrorism and politicians fear a resurrection of the terror group.

The map application includes information from old and new buildings archaeological projects. This makes it possible to investigate whether water facilities (wells, cisterns) and waste facilities (cesspits, sewers) were the privilege of Leiden’s wealthy elite in the late 16th and 17th centuries or whether…

The Dutch press has given the anniversary exhibition in the Leiden Meelfabriek some rave reviews: ‘Global Imaginations is amusing and confrontational.’ The exhibition celebrates the 440th anniversary of Leiden University and can be seen until 5 October.

Lecture

PhD defence

The LUCAS Dissertation Prize has been awarded to Dr. Renske Janssen for her PhD thesis Religio Illicita? Roman Legal Interactions with Early Christianity in Context.

PhD defence

The Institute for History announces vacancies for three PhD positions on Rethinking Disability: the Global Impact of the International Year of Disabled Persons (1981) in Historical Perspective and one PhD position to conduct research on the United Nations Transitional Authority in Cambodia (UNTAC).

In a new Leiden-Delft-Erasmus Universities white paper, researchers and practitioners start the conversation that society desperately needs to have. ‘We’ve outsourced the visionary thinking to tech companies.’

A research team from Leiden University, in cooperation with Bureau Boekhoorn Sociaal-Wetenschappelijk Onderzoek en Advies (BBSO), is to evaluate Dutch counterterrorism legislation.