Developing new drugs is a difficult process. With the aid of artificial intelligence, Pharmaceutical scientist Xuhan Liu has developed methods that can help make drug design cheaper and faster. PhD defence on 15 February.

How do you manage a crisis? This is what Professor of Crisis Governance Sanneke Kuipers will address in her inaugural lecture.

The current COVID-19 vaccination campaign involves injecting the vaccine into muscle tissue, but injecting a smaller amount of vaccine in the skin might also provide good protection. The #wakeuptocorona crowdfunding campaign has enabled Anna Roukens (LUMC) to examine the safety and efficacy of vaccination…

A new app provides dynamic predictions of survival for patients suffering from soft tissue sarcoma. It was developed by the mathematical Institute research group DASPO, Data Analysis and Survival for Personalised Oncology.

Bacteria and fungi on organic dairy farms are significantly different from those on conventional farms. That was discovered by postdoc researcher Sofia Gomes and her supervisors Nadia Soudzilovskaia and Peter van Bodegom in collaboration with the Louis Bolk Institute and Naturalis Biodiversity Centre.…

The Japanese Studies community at Leiden University is deeply saddened by the sudden loss of our colleague, Erik Herber. He was not only an esteemed scholar and teacher, but also, to many of us, a dear friend.

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…

In the week of 14 to 18 January the Lorentz workshop 'Intersecting Worlds. The Interplay of Cultures and Technology' took place at the Lorentz Center in Leiden. Attracting many scholars from across the world, the workshop explored the transformations and responses of indigenous societies around the…

Leiden chemical biologists led by Dr Mario van der Stelt have developed a method to facilitate the search for new drugs. This method has allowed them to take an important first step in the development of a drug against obesity.

Zebrafish-human communication shows that cancer cells lacking a signaling protein are less able to develop aggressive metastatic properties. This discovery has been made by molecular cell biologist Claudia Tulotta. PhD defence 14 June.

No less than four Leiden research teams have been awarded a grant by NWO. On 27 July NWO honoured 21 applications in the Open Competition ENW-XL. NWO awards the grants to consortia in the exact and natural sciences who are doing unconnected fundamental research that is 'driven by curiosity'.

Leiden Biology student Lukas Kiefer has won the Unilever Research Prize 2018 for his research into efficient production of a new antibiotic. Kiefer: ‘I want to make biological medicines available to people in need.'

Pancras Hogendoorn bade farewell as Dean of Medicine and Vice-Chairman of the LUMC Board of Directors with a symposium at the LUMC.

Het zichtbaar maken van ongeschreven verhalen van inheemse culturen en volken van de Cariben. Dat doet de tentoonstelling ‘Caribbean Ties’ in de Oude UB.

On Thursday 9 November, Leiden University organized its annual Physics Ladies Day for female high school students. To mark this festive day, we put the spotlight on two female researchers, who talk about their experiences in physics.

From documentaries, zines and exhibitions to a video installation. Students of the Visual Ethnography master's programme pulled out all the stops to finish their studies in a fantastic way. For one year, the 23 students worked on their own multimedia projects. The screening of the projects took place…

Discover budding creators, artists and researchers at the Night of Discoveries art and knowledge festival. And many researchers from Leiden University are taking part.

Globally, the number of deaths from infections is on the rise as more bacteria become resistant to antibiotics. New classes are desperately needed. A promising resistance inhibitor is now being developed by the research group of Nathaniel Martin, Professor of Biological Chemistry. Inaugural speech on…

On September 12, Michel Orrit received his Spinoza prize in the Royal Theatre in The Hague from OCW Secretary of State Sander Dekker. With the award comes a budget of 2.5 million euro, to be spent freely on scientific research, and the coveted Spinoza statue. Orrit shared the honor with Eveline Crone…

Endocannabinoids - the body's own marijuana - are promising departure points for drug research. Professor of Molecular Physiology Mario van der Stelt examines whether inhibiting their production can be a way to fight inflammatory brain disease and to combat obesity. Inaugural lecture 19 October.

International pharmaceuticals company Grünenthal is to open an innovation hub on the Leiden Bio Science Park. The hub will make it easier for scientists and drug developers to work together.

Lecture

In 2011 Leiden University came into possession of the skeletons from a graveyard in Middenbeemster. But what could be done with all these bones and skulls? Well, the answer is: more than you might think. Since the excavation, it has been raining interesting scientific discoveries at the Faculty of Archaeology.…

From molecular ping-pong to cassava in the Amazon, and from extraterrestrial life to special antibodies. Twenty-five researchers from Leiden University have been awarded a Veni grant from the NWO. A grant of up to 250,000 euros will give them the opportunity to further elaborate their own ideas over…

The Dutch Research Council (NWO) has awarded Vidi grants to Leiden researchers.

On the 5th of May 2016, the second annual conference of the Leiden Center for East African Law (LEAC) took place at the East African Community headquarters in Arusha, Tanzania. The Conference was organized on the occasion of Europe Day with the generous support of the EAC, the EU delegation to EAC and…

Eleven lecturers from Leiden University have been awarded Comenius grants that will allow them to work with their teams on an innovation project within their own teaching. They have been awarded three grants of 100,000 euros within the Senior Fellows programme and four grants of 50,000 euros within…

From the Spanish Flu during WWI to COVID-19: the role of the American government in these Pandemics. Professor Giles Scott-Smith, who together with Dario Fazzi and Gaetano Di Tommaso completed the book project Public Health and the American State, discusses a century of American responses to health…

Data and information should be stored in a way that computers can understand, says Barend Mons, professor of Biosemantics at the Leiden University Medical Center and Chair of the High Level Expert Group for the European Open Science Cloud. We speak with him about FAIR data, knowlets and nanopublicat…

Leiden scientists are the main applicants for five projects that have been awarded a Science Groot grant of up to 3 million euros in the Science Domain. In addition, several Leiden scientists are involved in other projects that have been awarded funding.

PhD defence

Inaugural lecture

Paul Christiaan Flu, originally from Surinam, was a brilliant tropical doctor, who in 1938 rose to the position of Rector Magnificus of Leiden University. The war years brought his lightning career to an abrupt end: his son was murdered and he himself was imprisoned in a concentration camp. A sad family…

Inaugural lecture

Valedictory lecture

Inaugural lecture

Inaugural lecture

PhD defence

PhD defence

PhD defence

PhD defence

PhD defence

PhD defence

An overview of awards and prizes granted to our staff and students in 2020, as well as special appointments at Leiden University and other institutions.

The receptor nomenclature committee of IUPHAR, the International Union of Pharmacology, has several subgroups. Among these are a few that our division is involved in, those for adenosine, nicotinic acid, and GnRH receptors.

The financial sector, supply chains and ecology. Not necessarily topics you might associate with physics, yet it’s exactly what new professor Diego Garlaschelli is dealing with. The common thread? Complex networks.

The work done by SUMO proteins in the cells of our body is of vital importance. Molecular cell biologist Alfred Vertegaal has been studying these proteins for nine years, first with a Veni subsidy and then with a prestigious Vidi subsidy.