Can astronomers mitigate climate change? This is what Leiden astronomer Leonard Burtscher and his colleagues discussed at the annual meeting of the European Astronomical Society. For the second year in a row, the meeting was online. And according to Burtscher, it should stay that way. During a special…

An international team of researchers, including Federico Calle-Vallejo of Leiden University’s Institute of Chemistry, have taken the atomic-scale design of catalysts to the next level. Their research contributes to the quest for a method to generate or store energy more efficiently. The report is published…

The NEASQC project brings together academic experts and industrial end-users to investigate and develop a new breed of Quantum-enabled applications that can take advantage of NISQ (Noise Intermediate-Scale Quantum) systems in the near future. NEASQC is use-case driven, addressing practical problems…

Education & outreach

Leiden University offers its students a wide range of bachelor's, master's and minors that explore sustainability or climate. Here, you find an overview of those programmes in the academic year 2020-2021.

The central theme of Rik Mom’s research group is to identify what the electrode-electrolyte interface looks like when electrocatalysis is taking place. Using specialized forms of Raman and X-ray spectroscopy, we study the chemical state and bonding environment of the electrode surface and near-surface…

Research at the MCBIM group is comprised of the following research themes:

In 2021, Leiden University will develop a new Sustainability Vision 2030. This vision for the future focuses on the primary tasks of the University: integration and visibility of sustainability in our education and research.

With an MSc degree in Governance of Sustainability you are well prepared for a broad array of career prospects in the field of sustainability, such as working with or for governments, at consultancies or continuing your academic research.

Bioenergy with carbon capture and storage (BECCS) is a promising method for removing carbon dioxide (CO2) from the atmosphere and simultaneously generating energy. Yet this method is controversial, as it may require a great deal of land and water. Researchers at Leiden University have now proposed a…

Sarah Giest, Assistant Professor at Leiden Univeristy, researched the topic of regulatory and market structures that affect nudge implementation by private actors, captured by the ‘budge’ idea.

This thesis describes a study from both a theoreticaL and an experimental point of view.

Solar energy harnessed by plants and algae has great potential to be converted into biofuels for future generations.

Promotor: K. Kuijken, Co-Promotor: H. Hoekstra

An accurate description of reactive scattering of molecules on metal surfaces often requires the modeling of energy transfer between the molecule and the surface phonons. Although ab initio molecular dynamics (AIMD) can describe this energy transfer, AIMD is at present untractable for reactions with…

Light-Harvesting Complex II (LHCII) is responsible for light absorption and excitation energy transfer in plants and photosynthetic algae, while in high light it undergoes conformational changes by which it quenches excitations to prevent photodamage.

Sustainable energy from wind and solar is most readily available near the sea.

This dissertation focused on computational methods based on first principles calculations using the Density Functional Theory (DFT) framework. Emphasis was laid on affordable methods that can provide a tradeoff between computational expense and accuracy.

Following the Big Bang, structure in the Universe started collapsing under the force of gravity. This resulted in the formation of the first stars, galaxies and clusters of galaxies.

Promotores: A.P. IJzerman, H.W.T. van Vlijmen

The key characteristic of active matter is the motion of an emergent collection (such as a flock of birds), which is driven by the consumption of energy by its active components (i.e. individual birds).

“JARAK: the commoditization of an alternative biofuel crop in Indonesia” was a research program from 2010-2014 in which researchers from Indonesia and the Netherlands collaborated.

This thesis examines the impacts and challenges of water use of electric power system. This thesis found that there are large differences in water use of electricity technologies, with hydropower and thermal power being two large water users.

Promotor: K.E. Schalm, Co-promotor: S.S. Lee

Human civilization consumes a huge amount of fossil fuels, which has resulted in an atmospheric CO2 level which has not been higher in over 800 millennia.

meet our staff

Psychologists Emma ter Mors, Christine Boomsma and other research partners will share results from their work on the crucial issue of societal support for delivering carbon capture, utilisation and storage (CCUS) in Europe. You're welcome to watch the free webinar.

This summer school is for graduate (MA and PhD) students and researchers who have an interest in handwritten materials, editing, and the tradition of editing in the Muslim world. It offers theoretical lectures as well as hands-on practice with samples from the world-famous collections of the Leiden…

Philology and Manuscripts from the Muslim World

The LUGO Press is a student publication forum, rooted in academia and journalistic practices and published by the Leiden University Green Office.

Lecture

On 17 March Renate Dekker was awarded the Cardinal Willebrand Prize for her MPhil thesis on 'The Sahidic Encomium of Pesunthios, bishop of Keft: towards a new understanding, based on a recently discovered manuscript.'

Leiden University encourages all its laboratories to obtain LEAF (Laboratory Efficiency Assessment Framework) accreditation.

What is the environmental impact of the fish on our plates? And is an electric car really more sustainable when we include the generation of electricity? Jeroen Guinée maps the environmental impact of products and technologies. He analyses them from raw material to waste disposal. He was appointed Professor…

The challenges of building a sustainable society are unprecedented. But the Dutch municipalities cannot be faulted for their commitment. They are working hard, conclude Professor Eefje Cuppen and Lian Merkx, programme manager for energy at the Association of Netherlands Municipalities (VNG). To exchange…

Climate change is a challenge for both current and future generations. New biological resources have to be developed in order to meet the demand for energy as well as the demand for food.

To limit the effects of climate change, global average temperature since pre-industrial measurements are to be kept well below 2 °C preferably even at 1.5 °C.

Decentralized plug and play systems for energy production are the future picture of our society. Artificial photosynthetic systems are used for this purpose.

The long-held desire - to link structure directly to function and to explain molecular mechanisms based on basic chemical or physical principles - is finally coming closer, satisfying not only our scientific curiosity but also offering new solutions to the many challenges in the field of health, energy…

The research that is united in the Liveable Planet programme, touches upon a wide range of aspects of human life. The goal is to deepen and expand the scope and to connect more researchers. The following case studies are examples of current research projects.

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Ludo Block wrote the eleventh chapter of the book 'Post-Crimea Shift in EU-Russia Relations: From Fostering Interdependence to Managing Vulnerabilities'. His chapter 'Business as Usual? Police Cooperation under a Cloud of Political Animosity' can be found on page 204 of the book.

From 20 June to 12 August 2011 a team from the Caribbean Research Group, Faculty of Archaeology, Leiden University and the St. Eustatius Centre for Archaeological Research (SECAR) under the direction of Dr. Grant Gilmore III, Dr. Menno Hoogland, Prof. Corinne Hofman and Dr. Alice Samson carried out…

How can Critical Raw Material policies/strategies be enhanced in the EU context?

In the search for sustainable energy solutions, the idea of artificial photosynthesis has been proposed as an approach with which to use water and sunlight to produce hydrogen.