Promotor: Prof.dr. G.P. van Wezel

Throughout all domains of life, from bacteria and archaea to eukaryotes, genomes adopt well-organized three-dimensional structures that can change in space and time to accommodate preferred transcriptional programs for environmental adaptation, the maintenance of cellular identity and differentiation…

Bacteria often experience external challenges, such as changes in environmental conditions or attacks by bacteriophages.

Organization of the Leiden Institute of Physics.

The executive tasks of LeiCenSAA are performed by the director of LeiCenSAA, Ahmad Al-Jallad. He is assisted Marijn van Putten who oversees the office.

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The long term goal of the Biophysical Organic Chemistry/SSNMR group, headed by Prof. Huub de Groot, is to reach an understanding of structure, dynamics and functional mechanisms of membrane proteins and self-organized biological assemblies and to translate this knowledge into new concepts for nano-devices,…

Promotor: Prof.dr. J. Brouwer, Co-promotor: Dr. Remus Th. Dame

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This volume challenges the idea that the development of ‘democracy’ is a story of rise and progress at all. It is rather a story of continuous but never completely satisfying attempts of interpreting the rule of the people.

Promotor: G.R. de Snoo

The research in the Biosyn group is focused on the design, synthesis and function of the four major types of biomolecules: nucleic acids, carbohydrates, peptides and lipids and hybrid structures thereof. These biomolecules and their derivatives are used in drug discovery and chemical biology, to develop…

Treatment with special stem cells seems to be a good option for suppressing the immune system in organ transplants. Researchers are trying to learn from processes that take place in the human body during pregnancy.

The relative simplicity of the bacterial cell, short generation times and well defined and inexpensive culturing conditions have significantly contributed to our understanding of many complex biological systems. Yet the workings of the bacterial genome, seemingly impossibly compressed within a tiny…

Actinobacteria are Gram-positive bacteria that have a complex multicellular life cycle and are well known for their ability to produce a wide range of bioactive natural products (NPs).

Charisma K. Lepcha (PI, Sikkim University), Pradyut Guha (co-PI, Sikkim University), Rajib Sutradhar (co-PI, Christ University Bangalore) and Erik de Maaker (Leiden University) have been awarded a two-year grant of USD 18.000 to conduct research on the impact of ‘green farming’ on the sensitive mountain…

My research focusses on site-specific compositional and performance practices of music for organ and electronics and their musical-spatial values.

Our in-house human skin equivalents contain all stratum corneum (SC) barrier lipid classes, but have a reduced level of free fatty acids (FAs), of which a part is mono-unsaturated. These differences lead to an altered SC lipid organization and thereby a reduced barrier function compared to human skin.…

Mechanical forces are known to play an important role in bacterial colonies. In this dissertation, we study the self-organization at various stages of growing bacterial colonies, and focus on the mechanical effects of cell growth.

All life on earth contains DNA, which is used to store biological information. Organisms compact their DNA in order for it to fit inside their cell(s).

The Future of Multilateralism addresses current challenges and future perspectives of international and regional organizations. It aims to uncover how stable the foundations of global cooperation really are, particularly in the light of the latest unilateral and protectionist practices of international…

Recently, studies have shown the similarities and differences in sources of meaning between religionists, ‘nones’ and atheists (see several studies of Schnell and others). The present study that will be conducted in three European countries tries to clarify the relationship between meaning giving and…

The central theme of the NWO-project ‘The Promise of Organization’ is the evolution of political organization during the 19th century. We focus on the enthusiasm, arguments and concrete activities of the organizers as well as the criticism offered by opponents of modern political organization.

Petra van der Bekerom, Joris van der Voet, and Johan Christensen, three assistant professors at Leiden University, conducted a large-scale survey experiment about whether citizens are more negative about failing service delivery than private organizations.

Nucleoid associated proteins maintain the architecture of the bacterial chromosome and regulate gene expression, hinting that their role as transcription factors may involve local three-dimensional chromosome re-modelling.

This paper describes two synthetic lipid models designed to replace human stratum corneum (SC) in studies of the impact of volatile organic chemicals on the molecular organization of the skin barrier lipids.

Netherton Syndrome (NTS) is a rare genetic skin disease caused by mutations in the serine protease inhibitor Kazal-type 5 gene, which encodes the lympho-epithelial Kazal-type-related inhibitor. NTS patients have a profound impaired skin barrier function. Because SC lipids play a crucial role in the…

It is the aim of this project to better understand how the physical properties of lipids influences the structure and overall barrier function of the skin.

The lipid matrix in the stratum corneum (SC), the upper layer of the skin, plays a critical role in the skin barrier. The matrix consists of ceramides (CERs), cholesterol (CHOL) and free fatty acids (FFAs).

Beyond Empires explores the complexity of empire building from the point of view of self-organized networks, rather than from the point of view of the central state.

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.

Public management scholars have long debated public and private sector differences. However, the generalizability of empirical results has been limited due to the shortage of cross-national studies.

Physicians and researchers of the Leiden University Medical Center (LUMC) and Leiden University are working on therapies for restoring damaged organs such as hearts and kidneys. They are even trying to construct tailor-made organs. Read more on this topic in the new science dossier on Vascular and Regenerative…

Promotor: J. A. Bouwstra

This study discusses the position of the monasteries in pre-1950s Tibetan societies and how that position was informed by Buddhist monastic ideology.

Science, Institute of Environmental Sciences (CML)

Large areas of space are filled by molecular clouds that consist of gas and dust grains that are the remnants of dead stars. When these clouds start collapsing, the decreasing temperature and increasing density cause gas particles to start accreting onto dust grain surfaces.

Key research articles and book chapters of the Chromatin group.

Performances of solo keyboard repertoire can sound more or less polyphonic depending on the performer’s use of divergence in expression.

In January 2014, the research project The Promise of Organization hosted a fruitful three-day conference:

Can we develop new enzymes and cell factories to upgrade current enzyme cocktails towards complete degradation of biomass?

This research focuses on figurative Byzantine mosaic-floors that have been excavated in the geographical area of the ancient provinces of Palestina and Arabia (current Israel, PA and Jordan) dating to the Late 5th, 6th and early 7th centuries C.E.

Students searched for a student project about internalization and the effects of nanomaterials in freshwater organisms. Open to BSc and MSc students and any timeframe.

The European Council and the European Commission have a similar role in agenda setting. Both place issues on the EU agenda. However, these institutions have distinct designs. They have different political attributes (the European Council has considerably more political authority) and information-processing…

The project re-examines the role of the Catholic, Protestant and Orthodox missionaries in the cultural and social developments of the Middle East and their interactions with the indigenous communities, from the nineteenth century until today. It seeks to discover and retrace such ‘entangled histories’…