Human language is constantly evolving with its linguistic structure being shaped by language users at both individual and population levels. Focusing on the interplay between processes of language acquisition and communicative need in shaping human languages, this thesis introduces a novel computational…

Fascism tends to be relegated to a dark chapter of European history, but what if new forms of fascism are currently returning to the forefront of the political scene?

This research cluster is a part of the Institute of Political Science’s research programme ‘Institutions, Decisions and Collective Behaviour’.

On 13 January 2022, Pie Habimana defended the thesis 'Harmful Tax Competition in the East African Community'. The doctoral research was supervised by Prof. H. Vording and Prof. S.C.W. Douma (UvA).

On 21 September 2022 H. Hu successfully defended a doctoral thesis and graduated.

Mattias Brand defended his thesis on 10 April 2019

Researchers at the Leiden University Medical Centre (LUMC) have managed to culture human heart muscle cells on a massive scale. This is an exceptional achievement because it is very difficult to replicate heart muscle cells outside the body. Using a special technique, the researchers have now created…

Each year a staggering 18 billion chickens, turkeys, pigs, sheep, goats, and cows either die or are killed without making it onto someone's plate. Environmental scientists Juliane Klaura, Laura Scherer, and Gerard Breeman were the first to calculate this number on a global scale. 'Reducing these numbers…

Does a snake die when it bites its lip? Why will a mongoose survive a scorpion’s sting, but we humans perish? These questions occupied the minds of toxin-enthusiasts and Master’s students Biology Jory van Thiel and Roel Wouters. They collected information from many sources and published their findings…

For an assignment for the course Medical Anthropology, students were asked to choose a theme related to the Covid-19 pandemic, find information and present their work in a creative way. The results are impressive.

The national dietary guidelines in Australia, Brazil, Ireland, Japan, Portugal, and Slovenia benefit nutrition, environment and animal welfare, Leiden environmental scientists write in the journal One Earth. However, the national guidelines of other countries face trade-offs, negatively impacting at…

From towering mechanical heroes to city-destroying battles, giant robots have become one of the most iconic images in Japanese animation. On 28 April 2026, Leiden University will host

Animal species that are dear to us in the Netherlands often spend a large part or all of their lifecycle in other parts of the world. But their habitats worldwide are under increasing pressure, are often inadequately protected and much poorer than the global average. ‘If we truly care about these animals,…

In this conversation-analytic study, the authors analyze conversations between researchers from different disciplines and community members to examine relationship building in real life. This is an open access article under the Creative Commons By license.

This study has been carried out in the community of Sukamiskin, a kelurahan (‘village’) in Bandung, the Capital of West Java Province, located in the Sunda Region of Indonesia.

This article examines the position of victims and those affected within communication theory. Current research has broadly been skewed toward reputation management and protecting brand value as primary goals of crisis communication efforts. The authors offer recommendations for crisis communication…

This research project seeks to understand the dynamics in the relationship between social media, mobile telephony and the social fabric under duress in Africa's mobile margins. It combines studies on mobility/migration, conflict and communication in an attempt to uncover these new dynamics, which have…

Professor of Cognitive Psychology Mariska Kret studies how humans and animals express emotions. Comparisons between humans and great apes offer important evolutionary insights, Kret will say in her inaugural lecture on Friday 9 September.

Livestock was already transported over long distances in the Bronze Age Netherlands. That is what researchers from Leiden University and VU Amsterdam have discovered. Publication in the Journal of Archaeological Science: Reports.

Prof. Gilles van Wezel and Prof. Mike Richardson of the Institute of Biology Leiden received €1.4 million to find new antibiotics.

Did you know that each year 18 billion animals die without making it to someone’s plate? Governance of Sustainability alumna Juliane Klaura has won the second prize for her thesis about the environmental impact of global food production. She won the prize at the university-wide master thesis award event,…

Anthropogenic noise negatively affects wildlife in a wide range of taxonomic groups.

In his historical analysis of upland societies of the Zomia massif, James Scott (2009) emphasizes how the modern state strives to control and “make taxable” all of its subjects. For Tania Murray Li (2014), the development of neoliberal markets is the primary driver of change, as she shows based on long-term…

On 11 October, Amanda Pasma defended the thesis 'Re-entry support from prison-based and community-based professionals'. The doctoral research was supervised by Paul Nieuwbeerta, Hanneke Palmen and Esther van Ginneken.

Promotor: J.A. van Veen, Co-promotor: E.E. Kuramae

How can we understand the encounter between communities active in sustainability initiatives and governmental agents at the multiple institutional layers in the Netherlands?

Yeast, alpacas, and antibodies. They may seem unrelated, but within the project of the Leiden iGEM students, they come together perfectly. For the international synthetic biology competition iGEM, the team is working on an innovative method to produce nanobodies—a special form of antibodies—using brewer’s…

The center studies the many ways in which issues of law and justice are dealt with in art and literature with a focus on liminal issues and cases. These are issues and cases where law comes to the limits of what it is capable of dealing with and art and literature explore the implications of what is…

The University of Trento hosts the biennial conference of the International Reynard Society, taking place on September 25-28 2024. Deadline for paper/session submissions: December 31.

Vinasse is a major by-product generated by the sugarcane biofuel industry. It is a source of microbes, nutrients and organic matter and often it is recycled as fertilizer.

This book explores the relationship between the production of new urban spaces and illiberal community-making in contemporary India. It is based on an ethnographic study in Noida, a city at the eastern fringe of the state of Uttar Pradesh, bordering national capital Delhi.

As part of the lecture series 'Religion Matters', Sven Gins (RUG) will speak about moving statues and other ingenuous devices in late medieval France. The lecture will take place on Wednesday, March 13, 17:00-18:00.

Who had a say in making decisions about the natural world, when, how and to what end? How were rights to natural resources established? How did communities handle environmental crises? And how did dealing with the environment have an impact on the power relations in communities?

During the Summer School Science Communication, you will learn everything about science communication.

Source: Nat Biotechnol, Volume 32, Issue 12, pp. 1213-22 (2014)

Imami Shiʿism was a key part of the turbulent thesis and antithesis which formed Islam, and it remains greatly influential today. The aim of the ImBod project is to write the first comprehensive social history of the Imamate.

This report examines the questions

Published by Brill Nijhoff and written by leading experts including national judges, academics and practitioners East African Community Law is the first comparative as well as open access textbook on EAC law. The book provides a key resource for the research, teaching, and practice of EAC law. It also…

Canal Watch (De Grachtwacht), which has been cleaning canals since 2018, has received the Dutch Research Council (NWO) Communication Initiative Award.

This study attempts to understand how indigenous community institutions pose an important role in sustainable community-based development, including the integration between local culture and development.

Through his project we will unravel the global regulatory networks that control gene expression in Streptomyces bacteria and allow them to properly respond to major changes in the environment; we will then harness this knowledge to activate and identify novel antibiotics

PhD defence

Wolves in the Netherlands mainly feed on wild animals such as wild boar and red and roe deer. But in areas such as Drenthe where these are scarce they also prey on free-roaming cattle used for nature conservation

Ragazzi, ‘Suspect community or suspect category?‘, Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies