Chemical biology research at the Leiden Institute of Chemistry is aimed at understanding biological processes at the molecular level to strengthen the knowledge base of human health and disease. The approach to achieve this goal is a fundamental chemical one; with the aid of chemical probes biological…

Het project heeft plaats gevonden onder begeleiding van Prof.dr.ir.Tjerk Oosterkamp. De titel van de presentatie is:"Determining the concentration of Chlorophyll-a in ditch water through UV/VIS Absorption Spectroscopy." De datum van de presentatie is dinsdag 30 januari om 15:00 in het Oort gebouw, zaal…

Nicolaas Bloembergen, who won the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1981, passed away on 5 September in Tucson, Arizona. Bloembergen obtained his PhD on nuclear spin resonance in 1948 at Leiden University. Some articles about his life.

Milan Allan has received the Bryan R. Coles Prize at the International Conference on Strongly Correlated Electron Systems (SCES) in Prague.

Of this year’s four NWO Spinoza Prizes, two have been awarded to Leiden researchers. On 12 September, Eveline Crone and Michel Orrit received their prizes, the highest scientific award in the Netherlands. The Spinoza Prize carries an award of 2.5 million euros.

We learned of the passing away of Nicolaas Bloembergen, Nobel Prize winner in Physics (1981) at the age of 97.

The National Roadmap for Large-Scale Research Facilities programme of NWO enables the building or renovation of research facilities with international allure. Leiden NMR groups take part in the uNMR-NL consortium coordinated by Marc Baldus (Utrecht University) that has been awarded almost 18 million…

Former PhD student Cameron Mackie will been awarded not one, but two dissertation prizes for his thesis on the aromatic universe. His work could provide us with a virtual sniff of space. ‘These molecules in space likely smell like a big charcoal grill!’

Plants could be regarded as small chemical factories, which produce chemical substances via photosynthesis. If we can imitate photosynthesis in an artificial system, we can make clean fuels and materials out of sunlight and CO2. Huub de Groot is very close to designing a system of this kind.

Speakers that have accepted to participate:

Wiskunde en Natuurwetenschappen, Leids Instituut voor Chemisch Onderzoek (LIC)

The European Physical Society has awarded the prestigieus Edison Volta Prize to Leiden physicist Michel Orrit. The prize is handed out every two years to an individual or a group of at most three scientists as an acknowledgment of an outstanding achievement in physics research.

How can rare and expensive materials be used more efficiently to produce cleaner and cheaper fuel? Under the guidance of Marc Koper, Professor of Catalysis and Surface Chemistry, international teams of scientists have published 3 articles in Nature Communications.

Students from the Coornhert Lyceum from Haarlem visited the Babylab Leiden together with their teacher Roos Bannenberg. The 5-VWO students follow modules of 10 weeks for science orientation and they had difficulty imagining what research with babies looks like. The Babylab Leiden gave a solution.

The Executive Board has appointed Professor Harold Linnartz as Professor of Laboratory Physics with effect from 1 June 2011. Linnartz has worked since 2005 as senior lecturer at the Leiden Observatory.

Central in coordination and organometallic chemistry is the synthesis of new chelating ligands, the synthesis and characterization of metal complexes with these ligands, and the study of their properties. An important goal in my research is to create understanding of the relation between the structures…

Alexander Kros studies supramolecular systems in a biological environment. The unifying theme between the projects in my lab is specific molecular recognition, i.e. the intermolecular interaction between complementary molecules with high affinity and selectivity. Studying, imitating and dissecting processes…

The Microscopy Unit houses, maintains and coordinates most of the microscopy equipment of the IBL. The available equipment ranges from conventional light and fluorescence microscopes, to confocal laser scanning and electron microscopes. In addition, infrastructure is available for histology, including…

Researchers from the Plant Ecology and Phytochemistry group at the Institute of Biology Leiden (IBL) received an STW (Stichting Technologische Wetenschappen) grant for applied studies in plant herbivore resistance with potential for a novel resistance test.

An international team of astronomers, with researchers at Leiden Observatory playing a leading role, has mapped the fuel for galaxy formation in the iconic Hubble Ultra Deep Field. The results of the research have been accepted for publication in The Astrophysical Journal.

At the New Year’s reception of the Faculty of Science on 6 January, it was announced that Annelien Zweemer, Leiden Academic Centre for Drug Research, has been awarded the ‘Discoverer of the Year 2014’ prize. Matteo Brogi, Leiden Observatory, wrote the best dissertation in 2014 and Dennis Claessen, Institute…

Advanced fluorescence microscopy techniques have revealed how steroid receptors move inside the nucleus. The results were published by a team from Leiden University and the Erasmus Medical Center in Rotterdam, led by IBL-researcher Marcel Schaaf.

Every year The Young Academy (a sub-group of KNAW) nominates ten talented researchers to join their ranks. This year two of the nominees are from Leiden University: Quentin Bourgeois and Frans Snik.

For many years, scientists have observed a correlation between Alzheimer’s disease and a surplus of iron in the brain. However, a causal link between the two has not been proven yet. We lack knowledge concerning the specific form of iron that is involved in the development of neurodegenerative diseases.…

Leiden researchers have found minute movements in the laccase enzyme. This discovery could lead to the development of much more efficient biofuel cells. Publication in Biophysical Journal.

Biophysicist Anjali Pandit has been awarded a FOM 'Projectruimte' research grant for her proposal ‘Tuning into the photosynthetic membrane with atomistic precision’.

Dr Bela Bode receives a Feodor Lynen research fellowship for postdoctoral researchers by the Alexander von Humboldt-Foundation for development of new methods for signal enhancement in solid state NMR. He aims to create a specific analytical tool for surface studies and research on membranes and membrane…

Researchers led by Professor of Chemistry Marcellus Ubbink have recently published a study in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS) about the dynamics of an important redox enzyme. This work was accomplished thanks to an NWO VICI subsidy granted to Professor Ubbink.

Leiden physicist Maarten Kruithof has discovered how our DNA is infallibly able to fold itself and to unfold again. In his dissertation he demonstrates how DNA is folded in a single long, very flexible spiral.

STM scanning experiments on poorly conducting materials are challenging, and can cause a distortion effect. A new model corrects for this effect, allowing physicists to better study materials in their quest to understand unconventional superconductivity. Publication in Physical Review B as Editor’s…

PhD student Thierry Rohmer received the Ernst Award 2009 of the Gesellschaft Deutscher Chemiker (GDCh) for his publication in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Science of the USA on the structure-function relation of the photoreceptor phytochrome. The prize was presented at the Annual Discussion…

Plants use sunlight to perform photosynthesis, but with too much light they have to dim their activity and protect their cells against photo damage. The protein PsbS acts as a light-stress sensor and plays a key role in this process. Article in Nature’s Scientific Reports.

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Provenance and distribution of raw materials

Astronomers want to understand the Universe, from the Big Bang to the present day, and what the future will hold. In Leiden they focus on two key questions: ‘How did stars and planets originate’ and ‘How were galaxies and black holes formed in the young Universe?’ A new generation of telescopes – just…

The aim of ANCIENT CHARM was to develop neutron-imaging techniques and the associated equipment, and help establish neutron imaging as a mainstream archaeological analytical technique. In particular, one of the goals was a new imaging technique which called neutron resonant capture imaging combined…

Graphene and other layered materials combine into completely new substances. Leiden physicists establish the ground rules for designing such materials by measuring how the layers in the stack interact. Publication on November 29 in Nature Communications.

Two of our colleagues received a royal decoration. Professor Jo Hermans became “Ridder in de Orde van Oranje Nassau”, and Professor Jan Schmidt became “Officier in de Orde van Oranje Nassau”. They receive the decoration as an acknowledgement for their extraordinary and selfless contribution to others…

Physicists Lucia Bossoni and Martina Huber have been awarded an NWA Ideeëngenerator-grant for research into iron nanoparticles in the brain. These nanoparticles may be linked to air pollution and Alzheimer's disease.

Ecologist Rosaleen March from the Institute of Environmental Sciences (CML) will carry on her research on functional biodiversity: a measure to assign value to ecosystems. Following her previous Marie Curie co-fund, she now receives a full Marie Curie fellowship. March: ‘We need to know how losing biodiversity…

Leiden physicists have managed to detect a single molecule called dibenzoterrylene in a new crystal, and found that it is a candidate component for a quantum network. Future quantum computers will need such a network to work together while maintaining their advantages. Publication in ChemPhysChem jo…

Using photosynthesis to generate energy, or using enzymes to effectively produce biofuel; Leiden chemists Huub de Groot en Hermen Overkleeft have both obtained an NWO TOP funding for their pioneering research. With the money they can take on new PhD students.

Catalysts are indispensable in everyday life. We know what they do and more or less how they do it, but we still lack a fundamental understanding about their functioning at an atomic scale. Therefore, Irene Groot from the Leiden Institute of Chemistry develops new measuring techniques to unravel the…

On Friday October 30th 2015 the sixth annual Jan Reedijk Symposium will be held. The main lectures of the day will be "Catalytic Radical-Type Transformations; Catalytic Reactivity of Carbene and Nitrene Radicals" by invited speaker Prof. Bas de Bruin (UvA), and "Structural biology in the gas phase –…

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