The expedition commanded by Nicolas Baudin to Tenerife, Mauritius, Australia, Timor and South Africa in 1800-1804 is fully researched in regard to ornithology.

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

Many galaxy clusters exhibit bright diffuse radio emission that traces the underlying structure of the intracluster medium (ICM).

This thesis revolves around the electronic spectroscopy of molecules in the laboratory and the search for the carriers of the diffuse interstellar bands (DIBs).

Galaxies form and live inside dark matter haloes. As a consequence, they are exposed to the tidal fields generated by the surrounding matter distribution: this imprints a preferential direction to the galaxy shapes, which leads to a coherent alignment on physically close galaxies, called intrinsic a…

An Active Galactic Nucleus (AGN) is a highly luminous region at the center of a galaxy, powered by the accretion into a supermassive black hole and emitting energy from radio waves to gamma rays, often outshining the host galaxy.

Promotor: A. Achúcarro Co-promotor: A. Boyarsky

The next generation of high-contrast imaging instruments on space-based observatories requires sophisticated wavefront sensing and control in addition to a high-performance coronagraph.

Even though more than 4000 extra-solar planets are known today, only a small fraction of these has been captured in an image. To better understand the planet formation mechanisms in solar-like environments we started the Young Suns Exoplanet Survey (YSES).

This thesis aims to enhance our understanding of galaxies by testing theoretical models of galaxy formation against observations, particularly in the cases of extreme systems which have been found to have an excess of baryonic mass in their central regions, in the form of either supermassive black holes…

In astronomy, the interpration of observations and measurements plays a crucial role: we rely purely and fundamentally on the information that reaches us as observers. And 80% of all matter in the universe is undetectable directly.

The focus of the dissertation

In this thesis, we present new laboratory data of interstellar dust analogues.

Galaxies in the local Universe fall into two main categories of spirals and ellipticals. In this Thesis, we explore the structural evolution of galaxies into this bimodal distribution.

Stellar feedback is a crucial ingredient in the evolution of galaxies.

Understanding how galaxies form, interact, and evolve comes largely from comparing theory predictions with observational data. Numerical simulations of galaxies provide the most accurate approach to testing the theory, as they follow the non-linear evolution of gas and dark matter in great detail and…

Within the field of astronomy, understanding how galaxies grow and evolve from the Big Bang to the present day is a challenging and complex question.

We investigate the buildup of galaxies from various vantage points. The first two chapters focus on the stellar content of galaxies, especially the distribution of stellar masses at birth and potential variations therein in various galactic environments.

One of the key discoveries in exoplanet research over the past decade is the abundance of small planets in our Milky Way. Despite their high numbers, our understanding of their atmospheres remains limited, and it is unknown if they possess atmospheres at all.

Planets are formed in disks of gas and dust around young stars.

This thesis explores the theoretical and observational properties of distant massive galaxies that harbour active black holes in their centres and shine brightly at radio wavelengths.

In this thesis, we use low-frequency and high-frequency radio observations to address the following questions regarding quasars: is the radio loud/quiet quasar dichotomy real?

This thesis focuses on protoplanetary disks: flattened structures of gas and dust around young stars in which planets are expected to form and grow.

Supervisor: S.F. Portegies Zwart Co-Supervisor: A.G.A. Brown

De Nederlandse fysicus Jaap Kistemaker slaagde er in 1952 voor de eerste keer in om uranium te verrijken.

In this work, I explore the creation of new methods that optimize simulations of the gravitational N-body problem. Specifically, I take advantage of the recent popularity of Machine Learning methods to find tools that can suit this problem.

Promotor: W. Jaffe, Co-promotor: K. Meisenheimer

Promotores: Prof.dr. E.F. van Dishoeck, Prof.dr. C.P. Dullemond

Promotor: Jelle S. Kaastra Co-promotor: Jelle de Plaa

A dense region of a gaseous and dusty cloud collapses to form a protostar surrounded by a disk and an envelope. This thesis uses both observations and models to study physical and chemical conditions of these protostellar systems which are likely where planets start to form.

This thesis examines the link between simple molecules and the underlying structure and chemistry within protoplanetary disks - the birthplaces of planets.

Understanding the formation and evolution of planetary systems is one of the most fundamental challenges in astronomy. To directly image and study young exoplanets and the circumstellar disks they form from, dedicated high-contrast imaging instruments are built.

Promotor: Prof.dr. V. Icke, Co-Promotor: T.I. Madura

This thesis focus on the interaction between M dwarf stellar winds and Galactic cosmic rays and the possible effects on the habitability of exoplanets.

Pulsars were first discovered in 1967 and since then the population has grown and expanded over several wavelengths.

Promotores: Prof.dr. A.G.G.M. Tielens, Prof.dr. L. Kaper (UvA)

In this thesis, the research focuses on the properties of dark matter and dark matter haloes and how they connect with the galaxies we can observe in the Universe.

This thesis is a (biased) journey through very different topics in astrophysics: quasars and new populations of active galactic nuclei, gravitational waves from merging black holes, and protoplanetary discs around young stars.

To address the fundamental questions of how life on Earth emerged and how common life may be in the Universe, it is crucial to know the chemical composition of the planet-forming material.

Promotor: Prof.dr. E.F. van Dishoeck

One of the key limitations of the direct imaging of exoplanets at small angular separations are quasi-static speckles that originate from evolving non-common path aberrations (NCPA) to which the primary adaptive optics system is inherently blind. The main focus of this thesis is the development and…

The high velocity tail of the total velocity distribution of stars provides essential insight into fundamental properties of the Galaxy.

The physical origin of the dozens of stellar-mass binaries, the mergers of which have been detected by the LIGO-Virgo-KAGRA collaboration via gravitational waves, is still unknown.

“Temminck’s Order” is the scientific biography of Coenraad Jacob Temminck (1778–1850), a Dutch naturalist and the first director of ’s Rijks Museum van Natuurlijke Historie in Leiden.

Promotores: S.F. Portegies Zwart, E. M. Rossi

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

In this thesis, I study the formation of large-scale structure and the physics of particle acceleration at large scales (~Mpc).

This thesis presents pioneering work on the panchromatic emission of some of the most luminous galaxies in the early Universe: star forming galaxies and active galactic nuclei.

The formation and evolution of galaxies is fundamentally driven by the formation of new stars out of cold gas.

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.