Jojanneke van der Toorn appears in several media trying to bridge science and society with the aim of contributing to effective and evidence-based diversity policy. Read more in English and Dutch media.

Team ReCNTR gives feedback on the Food Citizens? I-doc

Commentators and scholars view both social media and cities as sites of fragmentation. Since both urban dwellers and social media users tend to form assortative social ties, so the reasoning goes, identity-based divisions are fortified and polarization is exacerbated in digital and urban spaces.

If male budgerigars can successfully open a puzzle box with food, they become more attractive to females. Biologist Carel ten Cate and Chinese colleagues published experimental evidence for this in a paper in Science on 11 January. Various Dutch and international media wrote about the paper.

Illegal images spread fast via social media. That became painfully clear last week following incidents involving teenagers in Dutch towns. Bart Schermer, Professor of Law and Digital Technologies, spoke to NRC newspaper about the role and responsibility of social media platforms.

Environmental researcher Paul Behrens generated both international as national media attention with his recent publication in Nature Energy. The media included Science Daily, Quartz and the Dutch financial newspaper Financieel Dagblad. In his publication, Behrens warns for possible power disruptions…

Coen van Hasselt's research group quickly produced an app that enables doctors to determine the correct dosage of commonly used medicines for corona patients. Media in the Netherlands and abroad reported on the app.

Developmental Psychologist Anna van Duijvenvoorde talks about her research on the development of brain and behaviour in adolescents. An important part of this research is social learning which is crucial in puberty. Several media sources devoted attention to her research. In 2020, she received the Heineken…

The research conducted by Tilburg University and Leiden University on the relationship between aggression among prisoners and the strictness of the prison regime has received much attention in the national media.

Scientists have detected a neutrino with the highest energy ever measured. Leiden physicists Maarten de Jong and Dorothea Samtleben were involved in this project, which was widely covered in newspapers and online media last week.

Turbulent times in Italy: Deputy prime minister Matteo Salvini wants new elections so that he can become prime minister himself. He is campaigning on social media, including photos of himself posing in his swimming trunks.

A publication in Nature Plants by a team of Leiden biologists has received national and international media attention. The researchers can have annuals flower multiple times thanks to a particular gene they discovered.

Julia van Alem had never held a camera before, but she and her classmates were appointed as the City Photographer. ‘This project helped me learn how to create my own work better.’

Milou Deelen (24) rapidly rose to prominence as the Dutch advocate of frank talk about women’s sexuality. It has cost her dear, but she has received so much assent, praise and support that she won’t be giving up anytime soon. In the Annie Romein Verschoor Lecture on 5 March, Leiden University’s celebration…

Ewine van Dishoeck was broadly covered in national and international media with her prestigious Kavli prize for astrophysics. She won 1 million dollars voor her groundbreaking work on star and planet formation and on extraterrestrial life.

Research conducted by Deloitte, with advice from Leiden University and Nibud (National Institute for Family Finance Information), shows that six out of ten households in the Netherlands are financially unhealthy. National media paid much attention to the report.

Stijn Bussels will attend the two-day conference on The Tableau Vivant – Across Media, History, and Culture at the Colombia University of New York. He will deliver a paper on ‘‘Restored Behaviour’ and the Performance of the City Maiden in Joyous Entries into Antwerp’.

Martin van Hecke published an article in Nature, together with physicists from AMOLF and UvA. They have developed a metamaterial that folds itself up, even in multiple steps. Van Hecke appeared in the following media.

Trump caused a lot of controversy in his first month as president. University lecturer Andrew Gawthorpe discussed the new administration’s decisions in various media.

Maarten Lamers and Peter van der Putten were guest editors of magazine Terugkoppeling, the publication of the NVON (Dutch Association for Education in Natural Sciences), and wrote two articles. On March the 29th 2018 the Media Technology lecturers are opening speakers at the national Bétatechniekdag,…

This PhD project analyses the politics and aesthetics of depictions of torture in American and European ‘war on terror’ films.

An international team of more than 200 astronomers from 18 countries has published hundreds of thousands of unknown galaxies. The data are part of a project lead by Leiden professor of Observational cosmology Huub Röttgering. Both Dutch and international media reported extensively about the publica…

On behalf of trade union FNV, Egbert Jongen and Heike Vethaak from Leiden University conducted a study on income distribution over the past 40 years. Dutch national media outlets have given extensive news coverage to their study.

This research cluster centres on regional, national, and global intersections and interactions between a variety of artistic expressions and society. It focuses not only on objects (artistic, literary, cinematic, and medial), but also on practices (aesthetic, political, and cultural).

Snowball the cockatoo gained world fame on social media. Millions of people saw him dance to Queen and The Backstreet Boys. In the journal Current Biology scientists study Snowball's dancing abilities and what they teach us about the origins of dance. Professor of Animal Behaviour Carel ten Cate casts…

The Van Hecke group published in Nature Physics about programmable origami, which was covered in the following media.

An important award like the Spinoza Prize, the 'Dutch Nobel Prize', generates lots of media attention. An overview.

Several Spanish media paid attention to associate professor Eric Storm’s new book Nationalism.

The 2018 Physics Nobel Prize is awarded to Arthur Ashkin, Donna Strickland and Gérard Mourou for their research on optical tweezers based on lasers. Leiden physicists comment in the following media.

This project investigates which aspects of social media content adolescents attend to and how these relate to their credibility judgments, aiming to systematically understand their susceptibility to misinformation and inform effective educational programs that foster youth’s resilience to misinforma…

The Digital Humanities and Cultural Analytics minor will be offered in the 2026 academic year, and replaces the 2025/2026 Digital Humanities and AI Minor.

Commonplace - Photographs from the Drummond-Fyvie Collection and the Ngilima Collection. By Tamsyn Adams and Sophie Feyder.

How does the Chinese government communicate with its citizens? Yuxi Nie obtained her PhD with her thesis on communication strategies of the Chinese state media agency Xinhua. She discovered that on social media, Xinhua communicated in different ways, depending on the target group.

Op de Dag van de Persvrijheid (3 mei) verscheen de 16e editie van de Persvrijheidsmonitor, die de staat van de persvrijheid in Nederland in kaart brengt. Ondanks de hoge positie van Nederland op de wereldranglijst – plaats drie – blijft de veiligheid van journalisten een punt van zorg.

The Film and Photographic Studies programme will equip you with a broad and interdisciplinary knowledge of lens-based media.

Press coverage for the Nature Physics-paper about topological materials by Anne Meeussen, Erdal Oğuz, Yair Shokef and Martin van Hecke

Bubble baths and face masks: that’s what we often see on social media when discussing self-love. However, is this a true reflection of what self-love and self-care entail? In this episode, psychotherapist Kelly Ziemer teaches us more about what true self-love and self-care are, and their importance.

Associate professor Salvador Santino Regilme commented in several international media on the situation in Venezuela.

Media in the Netherlands and abroad reported extensively about the drug research led by Leiden chemist Mario van der Stelt. In this research, Van der Stelt shows which unwanted side-effects a French drug candidate has.

Stay tuned for updates on relevant media appearances of Anne-Laura van Harmelen.

In the days following Christmas, Christa Tobler gave a series of interviews to Swiss newspapers and Swiss radio about the new Trade and Cooperation Agreement between the EU and the UK and about what it might mean for Switzerland-EU relations and the draft EU-Swiss institutional framework agreement.

Cultural Anthropology and Development Sociology at Leiden University studies the everyday practices of individuals and groups around the world in relation to the complex global challenges of diversity, sustainability, and digitalisation.

The environment also benefits when people follow national nutritional guidelines, Paul Behrens demonstrated in research published in PNAS. The publication attracted media attention both at home and internationally.

For the second time in six months, Hans-Martien ten Napel has been invited to write the opening essay for a series of international blog posts.

This research explores the question of what contemporary mapmaking practices can reveal about the ever-evolving field of graphic design.

In the South African context, certain iconic images have been a dominant source for public understandings of historical events. The emphasis given these images tends to overshadow the historical value of other more personal photographic sources – like studio or amateur photography. This project looks…