In the near future oral polio vaccine (OPV) will be replaced by inactivated polio vaccine (IPV) as part of the eradication program of polio. For that reason, there is a need for substantial amount of safe and more affordable IPV for low-income countries. Bioneedles, which are biodegradable mini-implants,…

Promotores: Prof.dr. G.F.A Kersten, Prof dr. J.A. Bouwstra

This thesis describes the development of improved formulations and alternative delivery strategies for polio vaccination.

Appropriate animal models for intradermal vaccine delivery are scarce. Given the high similarity of their skin anatomy to that of humans, minipigs may be a suitable model for dermal vaccine delivery.

Liposomes hold great promise for peptide-based personalized cancer vaccination, especially when administered intradermally. However, current liposome preparation methods are very time consuming (resulting in long development times per formulation), whereas personalized cancer vaccination requires very…

Traditionally, vaccines are administered intramuscularly using conventional hypodermic needles, which cause pain and distress. Microneedles are very short needles (smaller than 1 mm) that are practically invisible to the naked eye. Microneedles may administer vaccine into the skin in a pain-free manner.…

Traditionally, vaccines are administered intramuscularly using conventional hypodermic needles, which cause pain and distress. Microneedles are very short needles (smaller than 1 mm) that are practically invisible to the naked eye.

Microneedles are a promising tool for the painless administration of vaccines through the skin. But, are these minuscule needles really effective? PhD student Pim Schipper of the Leiden Academic Centre for Drug Research investigated various factors of vaccination via the skin and discovered, among other…

If it’s up to PhD student Guangsheng Du, patients don’t need to worry about big needles anymore. At the Leiden Academic Center for Drug Research (LACDR), he studied the use of microneedles and nanoparticles as a new vaccination system. ‘I want to create a more patient-friendly delivery method.’ He defends…

A collection of newly written chapters by various specialists from different disciplines (with a background in philosophy) on the subject of free will as it is discussed in their (inter)disciplinary field.

Lecture, Van Leeuwenhoek Lecture on BioScience

Source: Biosens Bioelectron, Volume 74, pp. 233-42 (2015)

Everyone wherever they are in the world can follow free online academic courses offered by Leiden University.

An analysis of researchers' global mobility reveals that limiting the circulation of scholars will damage the scientific system.

Supervisors: Bart Lenselink (Leiden University) / Willem Jespers (Uppsala University)

An important feature of atopic eczema (AE) is a decreased skin barrier function. The stratum corneum (SC) lipids - comprised of ceramides (CERs), free fatty acids (FFAs) and cholesterol - fulfill a predominant role in the skin barrier function.

Analysing the ways in which immigration structurally challenges and changes the organization and conceptual boundaries of national welfare states.

We are developing the conceptual framework, which is new to this taxonomic group, and evaluate the current state of the art with respect to all critical parameters and transfer functions for a fully developed Population Consequences of Acoustic Disturbance (PCAD) model.

The stratum corneum (SC) plays a fundamental role in the barrier function of the skin. The SC consists of corneocytes embedded in a lipid matrix.

Two Leiden scientists - Ignas Snellen and Bernhard Hommel - have been awarded an ERC Advanced Grant. The grant will fund their research over the coming five years on exoplanets and free will.

How did “free agents” (entrepreneurs operating outside of the myriad of interests of the centralized, state-sponsored monopolies) in Western Europe and the Ottoman Empire react to the creation of colonial monopolies (royal monopolies and chartered companies) by the central states in the Early Modern…

Majorana fermions in superconductors are the subgap quasiparticle excitations that are their own antiparticles.

In this study, we evaluated the influence of supercritical carbon dioxide (scCO2) spray drying conditions, in the absence of organic solvent, on the ability to produce dry protein/trehalose formulations at 1:10 and 1:4 (w/w) ratios.

In Europe, archaeological traces of fire become more frequent between 300,000 and 400,000 years ago; but could the earliest occupants have survived without fire for at least half a million years before this? How could the early occupants of Europe have kept warm and processed meat without fire?

On 3 September 2019, Ilektra Antonaki defended her thesis 'Privatisations and golden shares: Bridging the gap between the State and the market in the area of free movement of capital in the EU'. The doctoral research was supervised by Prof. S.C.G. Van den Bogaert.

The role of transnational, non-institutional networks in the opening up of British transatlantic trade at the end of the 17th/beginning of the 18th century

Two weeks after 3 October the Leiden canals were still full of plastic disposable cups. Auke-Florian Hiemstra and fellow students have fished thousands of these cups out of the canals and photographed them. Now they put a photo of one of these canal cups on Instagram every day.

Promotores: B. Erez, P. Stevenhagen, Co-Promotor: B. de Smit

The Dutch House of Representatives is deeply divided about the contested trade agreement between the European Union and Canada (Ceta). The economic figures are favourable in relation to Ceta, which has led to the removal of 98% of the import tariffs. Imports from and exports to Canada have both soared…

During the course of drug discovery translational steps are made.

Christa Tobler, Professor of European Law at the Universities of Basel (Switzerland) and Leiden, participated in a Swiss television debate on the free movement of persons.

From 1 August 2020, smoking on the premises of Leiden University will be prohibited. Dutch law obliges institutions of higher education to enforce a full smoking ban on their premises as of that date.

On 5 September 2016 Space Awareness launched their first Massive Open Online Course (MOOC) on teaching with space and astronomy in the classroom.

On Monday December 17th the ILS 2.0, SOLID project will hold an afternoon Symposium on ‘Challenges to European Integration: welfare states and free movement in the EU’ from 11.45 – 16.30. The symposium will take place in room A.014 at the Kamerlingh Onnes Building (Steenschuur 25) of Leiden Law Scho…

Andrew Shield (35) is a University Lecturer at Leiden University and the cofounder of the Leiden Queer History Network. History, migration and sexuality are all subjects he is passionate about and teaches in. He wrote a book about immigrants during the sexual revolution, as well as one on contemporary…

‘Without that Veni grant, I would never have been able to delve into my subject so deeply. During the first two months, I only read articles and other professional literature. A dream, I would skip home afterwards.’

Language is a little bit like owning a mobile phone. We use it all the time, but we don’t really understand how it works. Where is language located in our brain? Do all humans have language? These and many other questions will be answered by professor Marc van Oostendorp in the MOOC Miracles of Human…

As of 14 May, people from all over the world can follow a little part of our university’s education through a new Massive Open Online Course (MOOC) on Health & Health Behaviour. This MOOC provides an introduction to the field of Health Psychology.

The LUMC is the first medical institution in the world to offer a Massive Open Online Course (MOOC) on clinical kidney and pancreas transplantation.

Giovanni Gruni publishes a peer reviewed paper in the Korean Journal of international and Comparative Law.

Artificial Intelligence (AI) can help humans in many different ways: from customised medicine and self-driving cars to preserving our cultural heritage. On 4 April academics from Leiden will talk about the achievements and opportunities of AI. A research dossier on AI is also online now, which looks…

On invitation by prof. Nikita Lyutov (Kutafin State Law University Moscow), Beryl ter Haar participated in a kick-off meeting on a comparative research paper on the free movement of workers within the EU and the Eurasian Economic Union held by Kutafin State Law University on the 24th of January 2019…

Professor Ingrid Tieken (Leiden University Centre for Linguistics, LUCL) and Dr Herman Siemens (Institute for Philosophy) have each been awarded an NWO Free Competition award in the Humanities for their research projects.

Dr. Ahmad Al-Jallad and Prof.dr. Peter Akkermans have been awarded with the NWO Free Competition Grant for their research project 'Landscapes of Survival: Pastoralist Societies, Rock Art and Literacy in Jordan's Black Desert, c. 1000 BC to 500 AD'. Together, they study settlements, burials and inscr…

Prof. dr. Marcel Cobussen has published a free e-pub: The Field of Musical Improvisation.

In her inaugural lecture on 11 September, Miranda van Eck, Professor of Cardiovascular and Metabolic Therapeutics, addressed her research related to developing medications to keep our blood vessels clean.

Dr. Tesse Stek has been awarded a Veni and a Free Competition (within the Humanities field) grant by the Netherlands Organisation for Scientific Research (NWO) for his research projects.

Aqueous solutions of proteins and carbohydrates separate into two parts with an extremely ‘soft’ boundary surface. The surface tension between these two parts can be manipulated, for example by adjusting the pH balance. This can be used to develop emulsions of a water-based solution in another aqueous…

Lecture