Viktorija Kostadinova, from Macedonia and currently a second-year PhD student at the Leiden University Centre for Linguistics, has just returned after two and a half months at the University of Michigan: ‘It was a truly rewarding experience.’

We continue to work from home as much as possible. How are the staff members of the Institute for History doing? Mike Schmidli shares his experience below.

Can Zebra finches learn to distinguish two very similar Dutch words? Research by behavioral biologist Verena Ohms proved that they can identify 'wit' and 'wet'. Ohms published her findings in

Lecture, LUCIS What's New?! Series

15 July 2016 was the hundredth anniversary of the birth of George Maduro, Leiden alumnus and namesake of Madurodam, a park in The Hague where visitors can see Holland in miniature. War-time and resistance hero Maduro died at the age of 28 in Dachau concentration camp. ‘A lot of the information we have…

At the project closure on February 29, 2024.

The feature drama film In Times of Rain will have its world premiere at the Guanajuato International Film Festival (#GIFF 2018) in Mexico. The film is a result of the Leiden University project ‘Time in lntercultural Context’, funded by the European Research Council.

Lecture, Leiden Yemeni Studies Lecture Series

Rietje Knaap’s (83) PhD was a real feat of endurance, but she persisted. ‘You’re married so you don’t need a pension, do you?’ What are the experiences of Knaap and women who followed in her footsteps? In the run-up to International Women’s Day on 8 March, three generations of female doctors look back…

Did you know that algorithms can help with the prevention of air pollution and ships sinking in the sea? A team of Leiden University researchers have worked together with the Dutch Ministry of Infrastructure and Water Management to look in data-driven inspection of ships. In this interview, Gerrit Jan…

It may not seem necessary to install special tap water stations in University buildings, but it is very useful: every tap here also means a tap in a developing country. With the the 35 tap water stations that Leiden University installs, the slum area of Madoya in Nairobi will soon have clean drinking…

Explore the One Among Zeroes |0100| project and its role in shaping the future of the digital economy, human-environment dynamics, and urban heritage in Indonesia's cities.

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.'

Sara Polak, PhD researcher and lecturer at LUCAS, has won a Fulbright scholarship to work on her research on Franklin D. Roosevelt at Yale University from September 2014 till February 2015.

Stories of resistance in the Second World War are widely covered in Dutch historiography: Hannie Schaft, Erik Hazelhoff Roelfzema, and Professor Cleveringa are some of the best known. But these accounts largely focus on the Dutch domestic perspective. On the other side of the world, a complex colonial…

Jan de Vetten brengt zijn promotieonderzoek ook uit in boekvorm. ‘In de ban van goed en fout’ beschrijft voor het eerst - op basis van archiefonderzoek en interviews - op samenhangende wijze de bestrijding van de CP en CD, en ook de reactie daarop van die partijen. Waarom werden ze zo fel werden bestreden?…

In less than a week’s time, millions of Turkish people are going to decide who will govern their country for the next five years. These elections promise to be the most closely contested in years, with the opinion polls showing very small differences and everything at stake, including for Europe. Alp…

Turning beer waste into a useful, sustainable product. That was the mission of students from Leiden at the international BISC-E event. The biology students challenged themselves and won third place in the Dutch finals of this competition. For this, they used the simple formula: Grain + fungus = coas…

Farmers on the outskirts of Nairobi National Park protect their livestock using flashing lights on top of the animal enclosures. This system keeps lions away at night. Leiden research has shown that the method is both simple and effective. Publication in PLOS ONE.

More focus on diversity in Antiquity, workshops for students with disabilities, and a card game to share stories about diversity: these and other projects will receive funding from the JEDI Fund in 2023.

Up above the world so high a giant star twinkles. Could an 83-year-old astronomer unravel the mystery of this megastar? ‘At times I thought: that’s it! I give up! It’s beyond me.’

For a lot of students, the covid crisis means that a sense of community is hard to find during their studies. Lettie Dorst, university lecturer of translation studies and English linguistics, explains how she tries to create a 'community of learners’.

Brazil is one of the world's largest emerging economies, but more is needed if it is to use this economic power for all parts of Brazilian society. This will be the subject of Professor of Brazilian Studies Edmund Amann's inaugural lecture on 20 November.

Researchers from all parts of the world will be in Leiden from 2 to 4 May for a major malaria conference. The Leiden University Medical Center (LUMC) is organising a two-day workshop on how vaccines can be tested safely in humans.

Hundreds of new students at Leiden University attended the opening of the 2015-2016 academic year. They came from all corners of the world for the start of their new study programme. Portraits of some of the newcomers.

Just published:

The second instalment of the Humanities Lab - the three-year honours programme of the Humanities – has reached its conclusion. On 12 May, 11 groups of honours student presented their work in the Arsenaal building.

Sebastian Diessner, assistant professor at the Institute of Public Administration, has won a grant from the Leverhulme Fund together with three researchers from the United Kingdom. The grant, worth 350,000 euros, is for the research project: 'The Political Economy of Knowledge-Based Growth.'

For the annual Week of Classics, Dr Marike van Aerde and her team made a documentary about their research project Routes of Exchange, Roots of Connectivity. In the film the team touches upon the interactions of Greeks and Romans with the wider ancient world, ranging from the African kingdom of Aksum…

Today we received this tip from two of our students. It's about how to stay motivated while working from home. We decided to share it with you.

The summer has flown by and the Nexus 1492 team in Valverde, Dominican Republic, has once again had an exciting and successful season!

The asylum seekers’ centres in Hengelo, Almelo and Schalkhaar caused little or no nuisance in recent years. There have been hardly any incidents, according to information received by Dutch regional TV channel RTV Oost. However, Maarten Offinga, Mayor of Hardenberg, sounded the alarm with the state secretary…

Social and organisational psychologist Aukje Nauta, who is researching how companies can enhance individuals in a dynamic work context, discusses what science says about working from home in the video portrait made by the LNVH. She also believes that employers could look at the Netherlands for inspiration…

Nederland Circulair! is organising the week of the circular economy, for the second time. This is a great setting for Leiden University to promote several of the university’s circular initiatives. We will kick off with an initiative by alumna Noortje Schrauwen: Raw material beachcombing.

A day at the beach, games, a visit to an embassy and a pub crawl. The activities at HOPweek help new students get to know not just The Hague but each other too.

The team from Universidad de los Andes (Bogotá, Colombia) came out on top at the international online Moot Court organised by Leiden University and law firm Baker McKenzie.

Meticulous analysis of hundreds of photographic plates from the star J1407 between 1890 and 2007 show no stellar eclipses. Robin Mentel, a master student at Leiden University, could not detect eclipses of the star J1407 by a planet hypothesized to have giant rings, called J1407b. However, an eclipse…

Innovation in nest building: bird nests made from anti-bird spikes. Researchers from Naturalis Biodiversity Center and the Natural History Museum Rotterdam describe this behaviour in a publication.

Bachelor's students from all different disciplines came to the Master's Open Day to explore the options for their next programme. Some of them visited several different programmes and still have all their options open, while others wanted answers to very specific questions before making their final…

The theme of the Heritage Open Days Leiden on 10 and 11 September is sustainability. At four University locations guides will talk about the history of the buildings and how they have been renovated. And there is a first: tours in sign language.

From recurrent oil disasters to the outbreak of contagious diseases or major fires. Public organisations often learn too little from such crises, according to public administration specialist Wout Broekema. Staff frequently fail to communicate information adequately, which means that lessons are often…

In August 2019, LUCIS will again organise a summer school on Philology and Manuscripts from the Muslim world. Are you interested in handwritten materials? Then keep reading!

LUCIR (Leiden University’s Centre for International Relations), in cooperation with ISGA (Institute of Security and Global Affairs) and GTGC (Global Transformations and Global Challenges Initiative), will host a conference on 2 and 3 December 2021 about the lessons that may be learned from Afghanistan.…

Last Thursday, the April edition of the ILS Lunch Seminars took place. This well visited seminar took on a slightly different format, since we had the honour of receiving Leandro Mancano from the University of Edinburgh.

The art installation by Peter van der Putten and Jeroen van der Most was selected from nearly 500 submissions for an exhibition on climate change.

Pharmacologist Amanda Foks is one of the ten talented scientists who received a Dekker grant from the Hartstichting. She receives €427,000 to find a way to rejuvenate immune cells to prevent infarcts. Foks was nominated as Discoverer of the Year in 2016.

How were ideas about politics and society distributed in ancient China? Hilde De Weerdt, Professor of Chinese History, investigates this using new digital methods. We speak with her about networks, big data and digital humanities.

On 8 March, International Women’s Day, equal opportunities for women worldwide, empowerment, and gender equality take centre stage. For years, the role of women in the past has been nearly invisible. Four archaeologists reflect on this inequality of focus, from hunter-gatherers in the palaeolithic to…