Data science offers great opportunities for legal research, according to Simone van der Hof and Bart Custers (eLaw). But at the same time, we have to keep an eye on the unwanted side effects of big data - such as ethnic profiling.

We produce more data than ever before, and researchers gather more and more information. That data contains a wealth of insights and new possibilities. But how do you extract them? In Leiden, statistics and information science come together in innovative multidisciplinary research. Read more in the…

In a new book forthcoming with Oxford University Press, Dr Helena U Vrabec, guest researcher at eLaw and privacy lawyer at Palantir Technologies, explores the area of control rights under the GDPR.

M. Danhof, Co-promotor: O.E. Della Pasqua

Violent conflicts all over the world pose a great threat. Not only to the region’s inhabitants, but also to the cultural heritage in the area. This is the subject of the Europe Lecture in The Hague on 13 June.

Plants can’t run away from enemies. Still, it would like to keep life-threatening herbivores at a distance. This can be done with odours. Klaas Vrieling of the Institute of Biology Leiden found out with his team how plants change odour production to keep the munchers at a distance.

Jurist Gineke Wiggers wants to predict the expected impact of legal articles. Carel Stolker, Rector of the University and, like Wiggers, a legal specialist, is enthusiastic about the research. ‘A big data project like this will help us establish the effect of our work on society.’

On Tuesday, January 30th, the first symposium of the Data Science Research Programme took place at the Sylvius Building.

Mariana Gkliati was invited by the Lawyers Without Borders Student Division of Aberdeen University to participate in their Annual Human Rights Conference dedicated to refugee protection.

On Monday, June 24th, 24 employees of the Ministry of Infrastructure and Water Management (IenW) received their certificates for completing Data Science courses, offered by the Leiden Centre of Data Science.

Frank Takes, Assistant Professor at the Leiden Institute of Advanced Computer Science (LIACS), analyses the flow of funds in our economy using big data. With Jort Kelder, he discussed the value and importance of these data on NPO Radio 1.

Today, CBS launches the Center for Big Data Statistics (CBDS), a cooperation of an unprecedented scale in the field of Big Data. Leiden University and HumanityX are key partners.

Experimentalism has emerged as a prominent approach for addressing environmental problems. Christopher Ansell (Berkeley) and Martin Bartenberger (Leiden University) survey the diversity of experimentation methods, identifying their strengths and weaknesses, and suggesting possibilities for fruitfully…

How can we best protect cultural heritage in times of war? In an interview with LeidenGlobal, cultural heritage law specialist Evelien Campfens talks about her current research project on cultural heritage protection in Ukraine for the European Parliament (EP).

New Brexit publication of Christa Tobler, Professor of European Law at the Universities of Basel (Switzerland) and Leiden, on the protection of acquired rights: ‘After ‘BREXIT’.

‘The system is failing’, ‘the goals are only being achieved to a limited extent’, ‘we’re letting children down’. These are some of the newspaper headlines that followed the publication of a report by researchers from Leiden University in September. Commissioned by the Dutch Research and Documentation…

Researchers of the Leiden Institute of Advanced Computer Science (LIACS) have started a 4 year project on developing a system that sends out automatic alerts when components from engines are showing first signs of fatigue.

How can ‘Big Data’ be used in development and humanitarian aid, and what are the risks? Leiden University and the United Nation’s Global Pulse are organising an international expert meeting in The Hague on 23 October.

Winning gold in speed skating at the Olympic Games is not just a matter of training hard; data science can also lend a hand. Jeroen van der Eb of the Leiden Institute of Advanced Computer Science (LIACS) developed the measuring skate for this purpose, with which he recently won the Nationale Sportinnovator…

Data science is of vital importance in preventing future outbreaks of viruses, Professor of Data Science Aske Plaat argues. Inaugural lecture entitled ‘Data Science and Ebola’ on 13 April.

The World Data Visualization Prize for 2019 was awarded to Dimiter Toshkov, Associate Professor at the Institute of Public Administration, for his work on the theme of small states and good governance. The prize is a good way to raise awareness about the value of good data visualization.

Language evolution, targeted drugs or archaeological interpretation. Researchers are making increasing use of supercomputers that can rapidly process large quantities of data. This is one reason why the University data centre will be extended and updated. ‘Datamining means we can get a better picture…

How can data analytics be used as a research method in the field of legal research? This question was addressed during the Research Lab Legal Data Science on 23 September, 2016.

The Sport Data Center, a consortium of universities of which Leiden University is leader, is recognised as a Certified Partner of Sportinnovator. This makes the Sport Data Center an important part of the Sportinnovator ecosystem. Sportinnovator is the national programme for sports innovation, initiated…

On 24 November 2016, Dr Giulia Pinzauti, Assistant Professor of Public International Law at the Grotius Centre for International Legal Studies, spoke on “The protective reach of the law of armed conflict” at the PIL Lunchtime Discussion Group at All Souls College in Oxford.

As of 1 July 2019, Bart Custers is appointed as Professor of Law and Data Science at Leiden University. The chair is established at eLaw, the center for Law and Digital Technologies at the Faculty of Law. Bart Custers will focus on the intersection of law and digital technologies, on the one hand on…

On Thursday 7 May, Jolanda van der Vliet obtained her PhD based on her dissertation 'The International Protection of Environmental Refugees. A human rights-based, security and State responsibility approach.' The defence was held online. Jolanda worked on her dissertation under the supervision of the…

Doctoral Grant for lecturer to research witness protection at the international courts.

That a switching protein plays a role in protecting a plant from too much sunlight was already known, but how exactly was not yet understood. The research group of Anjali Pandit has now discovered that this protein changes shape when there is too much sunlight. The results have been published in Nature…

The combination of data science and sports is a hot topic. In a talk during the opening of the Academic Year at the Faculty of Science, Professor Joost Kok explained what data analytics can teach us about sports.

On December 4th an agreement was signed between the Leiden Institute of Advanced Computer Science (LIACS) and the Netherlands Forensic Institute (NFI). Cor Veenman (NFI) will perform research in the field of Forensic Big Data Science at LIACS.

We investigate bacteria and fungi to understand their malicious or beneficial impact on food crops and their pathogenic or antibiotic role in human health.

The manual analysis of remotely-sensed data is a widespread practice in local and regional scale archaeological research, as well as heritage management.

Assistant Professor Vedran Dunjko and his team received a gift from Google to support their quantum research. The research focuses on whether quantum computers can provide new ways of understanding the mysteries of high-energy physics.

EuDEco (Modelling the European Data Economy) is a Coordination & Support Action (CSA) receiving funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 programme.

A new discussion paper published in Policy Sciences by two Leiden researchers claims that governments are working with one hand tied when it comes to data on vulnerable groups. At the core of this paper is the idea that even though the volume of data has increased in recent years, the quality of the…

The Global Strategy for Plant Conservation, a world-wide effort by the botanist and plant protection community, is making considerable progress in protecting plant diversity around the world, a new report says. The Hortus botanicus Leiden is one of the partners of the project.

On Wednesday 13 December at 13.45 hrs Jaap Wieland will defend his doctoral thesis entitled ‘De bescherming van concurrentiebelangen in het bestuursrecht’ (the Protection of Competition Interests in Administrative Law) at the Academy Building of Leiden University. His supervisors are Professor Willemien…

Coral reefs throughout the world are under threat. After studying the reefs in Malaysia, Zarinah Waheed concluded that there is room for improvement in coral reef conservation. PhD defence 22 November.

On 1 November 2019, international Master's students Data Science from Leiden University presented the elaboration of their data concepts to senior officials of the House of Representatives and Rijks I-Ecosysteem. With the presentation, they successfully completed this part of the Data Science master…

The Centre for Digital Humanities is pleased to announce that we are searching for two PhD Candidates who will carry out research within the Centre for Digital Humanities and the Leiden Centre of Data Science.

The Vallesian, 11.1-9 Ma, was a special time in the Vallès-Penedes basin near Barcelona, where a biodiversity hotspot existed. Europe had a subtropical climate, with rhinos, forest giraffes, lions, hyenas, flying squirrels and primates.