Invasive aquatic plants are finding their way to the Netherlands with increasing ease. The same is true for mosquito species. This can endanger public health, for instance through mosquito-borne disease, and biodiversity. Ecologists Emily Strange and Michiel Veldhuis are researching whether there is a link between the increase in invasive floating aquatic plants and mosquitoes. With support from LUF, the researchers hope to implement their programme on an international scale.

Michiel Veldhuis is looking for answers that our world urgently needs. As an ecologist working on the Liveable Planet interdisciplinary programme, he researches the impact of global climate change on the African savanna.

Persecution, conflicts and crises are threatening academic institutions and researchers worldwide. This has major implications for science. Leiden University's Scholars for Scholars programme is helping scholars at risk through crowdfunding.

A book with a fake printer, a pamphlet with a treaty that does not exist and an execution print with a supportive crowd: just some examples of forgeries from the early modern Dutch Republic. They are exposed by LUC-historian Jacqueline Hylkema.

Riet Groenen was able to spend almost a year in Fiji for her thesis research on fertility and family planning thanks to donations from funds. Her studies, research experience and focus earned her a job at the United Nations. Groenen dedicated her career to women’s sexual and reproductive health and rights, and to ending violence against women.

To cover up their deportation plans which targeted Polish Jews in the Warsaw Ghetto, the Nazis re-opened schools. In her inaugural lecture, historian Sarah Cramsey demonstrates with examples how care was used ‘as a weapon’ during the Holocaust. She also stresses that care is a unifying cement in society and calls for more historical research.

Following his own path from a young age, taking on challenges, asking for advice and inspiring others with the insights he’d gained: that was Laurent van Vugt’s (1939-2019) path in life. In his will he left a bequest to LUF, which his wife established as a named fund: the Camino Laurent van Vugt Fund.